No tickets. No money. No purse even, Alice thought, instantly cursing herself, visualising her bag on her desk at the station. And everything, everything she needed was in it, including, critically, her identification. Surreptitiously she glanced at the fuel gauge. Full, thank Christ-that humiliation, at least, avoided-but the towers of the bridge were looming nearer, her crass ineptitude about to be exposed.
‘I don’t suppose you have a pound coin for the bridge, do you, Ma’am?’ she asked lightly, attempting to disguise the acute discomfort that she felt.
‘No, Alice…’ the DCI replied. ‘I assumed that you would have come prepared, so I didn’t bring my purse.’ The car reached the booth and the toll man extended his hand in automatic anticipation of payment.
‘I’m sorry, we’ve no money between us, but we’re Police officers-on Police business,’ Alice said, but hearing her own voice and taking in afresh the shabbiness of the unwashed car, the hollowness of the assertion struck her.
‘Well, well,’ the man sounded doubtful. ‘Must be some mighty big operation on over in Fife, eh? You’re the third car of polis I’ve had this morning. Do us a favour, eh? Prove it! Go on, hen, gie us, gie us a flash o’ yer blue light or something.’
‘Show him your identification, Sergeant,’ the Detective Chief Inspector said testily. Alice caught her superior’s eye, and shook her head, dumb with embarrassment. Instantly, looking daggers drawn, Elaine Bell extracted her card from her jacket and flashed it at the official. With a mock salute the barrier was raised, just as a lorry behind, lights glaring, began to hoot its horn, impatient for progress.
No-one appeared to be about, but the Freemans’ car was parked at the top of the first track, near the farmhouse. The building itself was clearly unoccupied, with metal shutters protecting its windows and fallen slates perched perilously in the rhones. Instinctively, the two women stuck together as they began searching the sheds that formed the quadrangular steading. The first one, cobwebs frosting the windows, appeared to be some kind of feed store with piles of old hessian sacks stacked against one wall and empty grain bins on either side of the door. Attached to it, fortunately with electric light installed, was a workshop, half the floor removed to form an inspection pit, and the concrete of the remainder blackened, coated in a thin veneer of ancient oil. Old Shell tins lay about the place, and on a rough-hewn work bench rested spanners, wrenches and other tools, beside a yellowing newspaper, as if someone had been interrupted mid-task and never returned. Next, Elaine Bell prised opened a stable door which creaked noisily, and as they peered in a rat scuttled, hunchbacked and lame, across an old table, then jumped, landing heavily in a pile of sawdust. Quickly, the door was slammed shut, ensuring that the creature remained incarcerated, unable to reach them. Over the excited twittering of sparrows perched on the roof, distant shouting could be heard.
‘Pepe… Chico, you bloody dogs. Come here!’
Following the direction from which the voice had come the two policewomen ran towards a patch of scrub woodland, finally stopping for breath on reaching a large haystack built on an old bonfire site. A few bales had fallen from the stack and lay, burst and broken, on the cold ash. Sitting beside them, incongruously, was a rusty can of petrol, and the stench of fumes from it filled the air, obliterating the gentler scent of the hay.
Suddenly, Alice felt two huge paws thudding on her back as an exuberant poodle welcomed her, then slid to the ground to shake itself vigorously, showering her with a fine spray of mud. Chico, not to be outdone, immediately bounced up on her before turning his attention to Detective Chief Inspector Bell, the flustered woman now engaged in a losing battle, ineffectually attempting to fend Pepe off with an extended knee. When this ploy failed, she turned in a circle hoping to baffle the dog and unbalance it, but inadvertently created a game, as with each turn the poodles revolved with her. Eventually, having lost interest in the visitors, the two dogs raced up the stack, chasing each other all over it, causing little falls of hay in their path and emitting high pitched yelps like excited puppies.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’ Christopher Freeman said, striding briskly towards them, stick in hand, staring at Alice and then at the Chief Inspector. He looked dishevelled. His jacket was torn, stems of dry hay protruding from the tweed, and it and his corduroy trousers were heavily stained, as if water or oil had permeated deep into their fabric.
‘Looking for you…’ Elaine Bell replied calmly. ‘I am DCI Bell of Lothian & Borders Police. Major Freeman, we’d like you to come back to Edinburgh with us, to St Leonards Street.’
Christopher Freeman said nothing, but stroked his chin between his thumb and forefinger. Just as the silence was becoming oppressive he said, ‘And for what reason exactly?’
‘To interview you about the murders of James Freeman and Nicholas Lyon.’
‘Oh for God’s sake,’ he exclaimed, evidently astonished. ‘You’ve got absolutely nothing on me. If you had a shred of evidence I’d have been pulled in long ago. I have an alibi. I was with Sandra, both nights, remember? She told you. I told you.’
‘No,’ Detective Chief Inspector Bell said quietly, ‘you were not.’
‘Have you been pestering my wife again?’ the man demanded angrily of Alice.
‘No,’ Elaine Bell snapped back, ‘she hasn’t. She’s been doing her job. Perhaps you should know that your wife is at the station at this very moment and she, too, is likely to be charged, obstructing us… as she has done.’
The man looked crestfallen. ‘Why, for pity’s sake… why are you dragging her into this?’
‘Because she lied to us. And she, like you, will have to pay the penalty for that.’
‘Well, do your bloody worst then.’ Christopher Freeman had speedily recovered from his surprise and regained his initial confidence. ‘We’ll get a decent lawyer. Maybe plead guilty to some silly trumped-up little charge. You’ve got nothing, after all…’
A crashing sound accompanied Pepe’s sudden descent from the hayrick, bales cascading to the left and right, one tumbling on top of the poodle, temporarily stunning him. A good portion of the structure had fallen with the dog, and beneath the remaining stack, a stretch of glass had begun to reflect the cloudless sky above. It was the windscreen of the white Volkswagon Polo. It took a few seconds for the impact of the revelation to sink in, and the first to react was Christopher Freeman, breaking the silence with a furious oath. Alice braced herself for threats, menace, physical violence even, and was beginning to feel the unpleasant effects of the adrenaline now coursing within her, but when she looked again at the Major she saw that he no longer appeared aggressive or defiant; panic had transformed his features, his face now pale and bloodless. Without another word, he struck a clutch of matches and hurled them towards the car, one dropping lit at his feet.
And then, mysteriously, time stood still, rendering Alice immobile, transforming her from an actor in the drama of her own life into a mere spectator. Before her eyes a man had begun to burn, snakes of flame encircling his legs, weaving sinuously upwards, twisting and turning, the heads of the serpents seeking out his face. And the brightness of the fire, its brilliant intensity, mesmerised her, drawing all her attention to it, making its source seem insignificant, compelling her to watch the strange spectacle that seemed to have been choreographed for her benefit alone.