Blind Eye

56

The CID office was empty except for Logan and a single bluebottle. It buzzed and battered against the window, then disappeared up behind the Venetian blind, the plastic amplifying the noise. According to the duty whiteboard by the door, everyone else was off on a job: burglaries, muggings, fire raising, drug dealing, assaults, prostitution. The whole colourful pageant of big city life.

Logan made himself a cup of tea and slumped behind his desk. The paperwork had backed up while he'd been off on the sick, piles of forms, reports, spreadsheets and statistics all needing urgent attention so some government idiot could pretend they were tough on crime…

But really Logan was just hiding from DI Steel.

And besides, how much of an idiot did Hilary Brander think he was? Having an affair with Creepy Colin McLeod? Who was she kidding? Everyone knew the man had a hard-on for junky prostitutes. She wasn't even a good liar.

Logan took a mouthful of tea, looked at his pile of paperwork, sniffed, then made a start.

Half an hour later he unearthed a padded envelope addressed to 'DETECTIVE SERGEANT LOGAN MCRAE, GRAMPIAN POLICE, FORCE HEADQUARTERS, QUEEN'S STREET, ABERDEEN, SCOTLAND' in a child's painstaking block capitals.

He fought his way through the straightjacket of Sellotape and poured the contents onto his desk: photocopied bits of paper in Polish and Russian. Rafal Gorzkiewicz's file on the man who blinded him: Vadim Mikhailovitch Kravchenko.

There was even a copy of the army photograph they'd seen at the flat. Rory's e-fit had been spot on. Kravchenko hadn't changed much. Obviously he was older and had a few more wrinkles, but other than that he was exactly the same, right down to the scar on his chin.

'Still alive then?'

'Hmm?' Logan swivelled his chair.

DS Pirie was standing in the doorway, running a hand through his curly red hair. 'Not seen Rennie have you?'

Logan picked a pile of burglary reports from the pile and dumped them on top of the Kravchenko file, burying it from view. 'No. Well, not since this morning. Think he's off questioning security guards for DI Steel again. Or something.'

'Ah… Finnie's not going to like that. He's already pissed off she's got you assigned full time. Says it's pandering to the sick-note culture: we should all be thrown in at the deep end, not mollycoddled.'

'That's nice.'

'If this was the First World War, he'd probably have you taken outside and shot.' Pirie settled back against the door frame. 'Seriously though: you OK?'

'Why does everyone keep asking that?'

'Only you look like a pile of shite with a hangover.'

Logan stiffened. 'I've got a cold!'

The DS snorted. 'Yeah, good luck with that. Might work better if you eat a pack of Lockets though, menthol might cover the smell of stale booze.' He pulled himself upright. 'We all know Beattie's going to screw up sooner or later. And when he does, they'll bust his beardy arse back to sergeant, and that DI's post will be up for grabs again. Twenty quid says I get it.'

'Make it thirty.'

Pirie nodded. 'Be a pleasure taking your money, McRae.' Then he was off, dragging out his mobile phone and shouting at someone on the other end.

Logan listened until Pirie's voice faded away down the corridor.

Silence.

He unearthed the Kravchenko file again. It was all still gobbledygook, but right at the bottom was a sheet of pale-violet notepaper, covered in the same childish handwriting as the address on the envelope. 'DEAR MR SERGEANT,

UNCLE RAFAL IS SORRY YOU ARE BLOWNUP. HE SAYS T HIS WAS A XIDENT ACCIDENT MEANT FOR BAD MENS WITH GUN WHO TRY KILL UNCLE

RAFAL. HE HAPPY YOU STILL ALIVE. I HAPPY YOU STILL ALIVE ALSO. THIS IS COPY OF FILE ON KURWA MAC KRAVCHENKO. IF YOU FIND HIM, PLEASE TO KILL HIM AND SEND ME PHOTOGRAPH. THANK YOU.

LOVE, ZYTKA X

P.S. UNCLE RAFAL SAYS THERE IS BOAT GO TO WHERE YOU LIVE WITH MANY GUN FOR KRAVCHENKO. IT CALLED "BUCKIE BALLAD " AND IT GO ABERDEEN 15 J ULY.

P.P.S. PLEASE TO REMEMBER PHOTOGRAPH.'

Logan sat back in his seat and whistled. A boatload of weapons on their way to Aberdeen… Probably replacements for the ones they'd found in that caravan in Stoneywood. Finnie wasn't going to like that, and neither was his paymaster: Wee Hamish Mowat. An all-out drug war was getting closer, and a lot of innocent people were going to get caught in the crossfire.

But the worst part of all was that Logan would have to go speak to DI Steel. The inspector was in her office, glowering at her computer screen as Logan entered — bearing two cups of coffee and a peace offering from the canteen. 'Got you a bacon buttie.'

She looked at the tinfoil-wrapped parcel and sniffed. 'You were a complete shite last night.'

He settled into a visitors' chair. 'If you're not hungry, I can give it to someone else.'

She snatched it up. 'Didn't say that, did I?'

He watched her tear into the thing, tomato sauce making a bid for freedom at the side of her mouth, then unwrapped his own mid-morning cholesterol treat. A booby-trap buttie: two fried eggs in a buttered roll, ready to explode yolk all over the place

They ate in silence for a minute, then Logan pulled out his notebook, flipping though it with floury fingers to the correct page. 'Buckie Ballad. It's a fishing boat registered out of Peterhead, belongs to one Gerry McKee. It's been out at sea since last Tuesday, due back early Friday morning.'

Steel washed down a chunk of buttie with a mouthful of coffee. 'Big deal. This is Aberdeen: fishing boats come and go the whole time.'

'Not with a hold full of ex-Soviet weaponry they don't.'

She stopped, halfway into a bite. 'Seriously?'

'Seriously.' He dropped a clear evidence pouch onto her desk: Zytka's note. 'I spoke to the Harbour Master this morning — the Buckie Ballad always comes into port when there's nobody about. I got him to go through the surveillance footage of its last visit and he's got blokes unloading fish boxes in the dead of night, straight into the back of an unmarked Transit Van.'

Steel picked up the note and peered at it. 'A boat full of guns? Bloody, God-damned, bastarding…' She frowned, polished off her buttie, then sucked at her teeth for a minute. 'Number plate on the van?'

'Image is too grainy.'

'You're dripping egg yolk on my desk.' She swivelled back and forth on her chair, while Logan mopped the wrinkly yellow drops up with his thumb. 'Right, who else knows about this?'

'Just you and me. And that's two quid you owe the swear box.'

'Oh… bloody hell!' She was scowling again. 'I was swearing all day yesterday, how come you didn't whinge then?'

'Wasn't on duty. And it's two fifty, now: I'll let you off with the "hell".' They spent the next twenty minutes working out Operation Creel on the whiteboard, then Steel got Logan to type up everything and get rid of the evidence while she went to the toilet. He was wiping the board clean by the time she got back. Everything else was done: requisition forms, risk assessment, contingency plan, and warrant application. She shuffled through the lot, then wandered off to look for the head of CID.

Logan didn't tell her there was nearly a foot of toilet paper sticking out of the back of her trousers.

There was no point just sitting there waiting for her, so he wandered outside for a cigarette. A clump of uniforms had gathered on the rear podium, laughing and drinking tea, so Logan went out the front instead, wandering down Queen Street, listening to the rumble of traffic, and the screech of seagulls.

He pulled out his cigarettes, but his fingers were so twitchy the damn things went everywhere. Half a packet, all over the pavement at his feet. No way he was smoking those now.

Stupid bloody habit anyway. Wasn't even as if he enjoyed it.

He carefully winkled the last remaining cigarette from the packet and stuck it in his mouth. Then reached into his jacket pocket for his lighter. He scritched the wheel, but nothing happened. Tried again. Gave the lighter a shake. This time sparks burst from the lighter's tip, tiny explosions, bright and painful, then there was flame.

Logan shivered.

Closed his eyes.

Listened to the thump and swirl of the blood in his veins.

Wrinkled his nose at a sudden, pissy smell.

'Are you no' needin' them then?'

Logan peered out at a dishevelled man: swollen nose, red eyes, bushy black beard; monk-tonsure bald patch; blue parka jacket with half the fur trim missing; trousers that had seen better days and some sort of curry, going by the stains; filthy grey trainers. Robert Danavell, AKA: Dirty Bob.

'What do you want, Bob?'

Karim's favourite tramp gave Logan a gap-toothed smile. 'Yer fags.' He pointed at the fallen cigarettes with a grimy finger. 'You no' needin' them oany mair?'

'Knock yourself out.'

'Ah, cheers min, yer a fine loon.' Dirty Bob creaked his way down to his knees. 'No' like that fat bugger yesterday. Tellin' me I'm stinkin' up his reception. Me! Wie ma best pal lyin' deid in the morgue…'

Logan watched him picking through the gutter. It wasn't much of a life, but at least Dirty Bob knew what mattered to him: drink, fags and the occasional half-eaten fish supper, or discarded kebab — whatever he could forage from the bins.

No life-or-death decisions. No moral or ethical dilemmas. No screaming heebie jeebies, just because some stupid song comes on the radio.

It probably said something about your life when you started envying people like Dirty Bob.

Bob was sitting on the pavement now, one of the windfall cigarettes clamped between his lips, patting round his pockets until he found a little book of matches. Lighting up with a sad little smile on his face. He looked up at Logan. 'Kin yeh spare oany money fer an aul mannie tae have a wee drink tae his best mate's memory?'

'Aul mannie? You're forty-two Bob, not seventy.'

Dirty Bob shrugged. 'Aye, but forty-two's a lot older in tramp years. Lookit poor Richard.' He sniffed and wiped a sleeve across his nose, leaving a clean-ish streak. 'Deid afore his time…'

Half past ten. Some of the pubs down on Regent Quay would have been open for hours, catering for the nightshift crowd and early morning drinkers. Tempting. Logan produced his wallet and dug out a fiver. Then changed his mind and made it a twenty instead. 'Here.'

Dirty Bob eyed it suspiciously. Then grinned and grabbed the note. 'Aye, that'll dae Richard proud.' He grunted his way upright, threw Logan a salute, then turned and hobbled away in his filthy trainers.

Twenty quid wouldn't make a dent in a seasoned alcoholic like Dirty Bob, not in a pub anyway. But it would probably buy a whole load of white spirit.

Logan ran a hand across his chin, feeling the stubble scritch. Maybe Bob had the right idea, burying his troubles in a bottle. Fuck the outside world. Make everything go away…

If nothing else it might get rid of his hangover.

Logan wandered out onto Union Street, across the road, and down Marischal Street towards the docks. The Regents Arms was a dingy little place, the windows covered with a thick layer of black paint, entombing the drinkers in dim, artificial light. After the brightness of a sunny morning it was like stepping into a tomb. A collection of apostrophes hung behind the bar — postcards, photographs, plastic ones stolen from shop signs, all there to make up for the missing one in the pub's name.

The place was almost empty. Two old men sat in the corner by the cigarette machine, nursing their pints. A haggard woman in a very short black skirt was hunched up on a bar stool, wrapped around an empty glass, a cigarette smouldering away in her hand. Skin pale as milk, blue veins visible in the depths of her cleavage. She looked up as Logan took a seat at the other end of the bar and smiled at him. At least she'd remembered to put her teeth in.

'Hey, sweetheart, you look lonely.'

'Not today, Carol.'

She squinted, then dug about in her handbag for a pair of scratched glasses. 'Aw fuck.' She raised her voice. 'It's the pigs!' The two old men didn't seem to care, so she waved her cigarette at Logan, and a flurry of ash fell across the bar. 'What, you going to arrest me for smoking a fag? Eh? Not got anything better to do?'

He shrugged. 'Carol, I couldn't give a fuck if you want to shoot-up right here. Be my guest.'

A pot-bellied barman poked his head out from the back room. 'What's all the…' He looked at Logan, shifted from foot to foot, then turned on the ageing prostitute. 'You can't smoke in here, it's against the law.'

She looked daggers at Logan, then dropped the cigarette into her empty glass, swirling the thing around until it fizzled out in the residue of dying ice cubes. 'Happy now? Bloody fascists.'

Logan pointed at the taps. 'Pint of Stella, large Grouse.'

The barman stared at him for a moment. 'Yes, Officer.' He poured the pint of lager, then stuck two measures of blended whisky in a tumbler. Paused, then added a third. He put the lot down in front of Logan. 'On the house.'

Logan put his hand out and touched the pint glass, cold beneath his fingertips, beads of condensation running down to soak into a curling beer mat. God he was thirsty… The last time he'd been in here, as soon as they realized he was a policeman, someone had offered to take his head off with a pool cue. And now, all of a sudden, they were handing out free drinks.

'I appreciate the offer,' he pulled out his wallet and put two fivers on the bar, 'but I'd rather pay.' Logan picked up the whisky. It wasn't even eleven yet, on his first morning back at work, and he was about to get hammered.

The glass trembled as he brought it up to his lips.

A police officer, drinking whisky in the morning. Way to go. Way to be a fucking stereotype. Detective Sergeant Cliche.

The shaking was getting worse. He steadied the glass with his other hand.

Closed his eyes.

Tried not to think about fire, and tearing concrete, and blistering paint.

Logan slammed the glass down and bolted for the toilets, barging through the door and into the eye-stinging reek of stale urine. He grabbed the edge of the sink and vomited, spattering the cigarette-burnt porcelain until he was empty. Then stood there, shivering.

He spat, cranked open the cold tap, and washed his mouth out, leaving the water running until all the chunks were gone.

Logan pulled out his phone, found the number he wanted from the memory, and made the call. Goulding's mousey assistant ushered Logan into the psychologist's lair, told him the doctor would be there in a minute, and asked if he'd like a cup of tea.

Milk, three sugars.

It was shudderingly sweet when it arrived, but at least it took away the taste of bile. Besides, it was what you were supposed to drink when you'd had a shock. Hot, sweet tea: that good old-fashioned British spirit of the blitz. Bollocks.

He looked around the office.

This was a stupid idea. Just the latest in a long list of stupid ideas.

Shouldn't even be here.

Logan stuck his empty mug on the glass and chrome coffee table, and stood. Sod this. He didn't need any help. He'd-

The door opened and Dr Goulding bounced into the room. A Liverpudlian Tigger in an ugly tie. 'Sergeant McRae, Logan, great you could come. Just working on the new profile, could really use your help.' He stuck out his hand. 'How you been?'

Logan coughed. 'I… can't stay too long, you know, operational stuff. Just came to… see how you were getting on.'

'Right, yes, take a pew.' The psychologist marched over to his scribble-covered whiteboard and launched into a presentation on his new Oedipus theories, now that Ricky Gilchrist was out of the picture. Goulding was so enthusiastic, Logan didn't have the heart to tell him it was all wrong. Oedipus was Vadim Mikhailovitch Kravchenko, and had been all along. OK, so Logan had no idea why a thug in the pay of Warsaw gangsters would want to torture and mutilate Polish shopkeepers, but it couldn't be anyone else — it would be too much of a coincidence if it was.

Goulding got to the end of his presentation, paused as if he was expecting applause, then settled into the couch's matching black leather armchair. 'I spoke to the Procurator Fiscal this morning: we're releasing Gilchrist on licence, Friday. I've asked for a supervision order, make sure he attends outpatient counselling, but…' Shrug. 'Of course, that's not really why you came here, is it?'

'What? Of course it-'

'There's nothing wrong with asking for help, Logan. Especially after everything you've been through.'

'I don't need help. I'm fine.'

The psychologist sat back, made a little wigwam out of his fingers, tilted his head to one side, then said, 'You don't trust me. That's OK, I understand, a lot of people are scared of therapy-'

'I'm not scared, and I don't need-'

'-they're not comfortable opening up to someone they don't know. It's not easy to take that first step, so why don't we meet half way?' Goulding inched his chair closer to Logan. 'You'll admit that you're having trouble sleeping?'

No point denying it: he looked like crap and he knew it. 'So?'

'I'm going to prescribe you a mild sedative to help you sleep. It's OK, nothing to worry about, just Zopliclone. Take one pill, two hours before you go to bed, and steer clear of booze. They won't knock you out, but they will help you get some rest. You'll feel a lot better.'

'I don't want sleeping pills.'

'And I'll give you some breathing exercises to help with any anxiety, or mood swings.' Goulding reached over to his desk and picked up a BlackBerry, tapping at the screen. 'We should set up a regular appointment… How's Thursday mornings for you?'

'Are you deaf? I said no!'

Goulding popped the top back on his pen. 'Logan, we both know that if you weren't ready for this, you wouldn't have come here.' The psychologist gave a big, theatrical shrug. 'Of course, if you're happy the way you are? Feeling the way you do?' Lunch was a microwaved mushroom risotto that tasted like rice pudding with sliced slugs in it. A factory-produced ready-meal manufactured by someone with a serious grudge against the world. Logan pushed sticky grains of rice around the plastic carton, not even bothering to tip the congealed sludge out onto a plate. It would just mean more washing up anyway.

The flat was a tip, a mess of paint pots and brushes, dust sheets and bits of unidentifiable DIY crap. He'd cleared a spot in the kitchen, just enough room for his microwaved yuck and the pills he'd got from the chemist's on the way home.

Logan stared at the packet of sleeping tablets. Read the list of possible side effects: confusion, hallucinations, memory loss, breathing problems. Might not be so bad. Take the whole lot at once and wash them down with the bottle of vodka he'd picked up from the supermarket…

He got up and dropped his lunch in the bin.

Then got the vodka out of the freezer.