Thursday legends

7

Bob Skinner shook his head as he stood in front of the house in which Alec Smith had been butchered. A small group of journalists and photographers stood on the other side of Forth Street. 'You know, Andy,' he said to his friend, 'I must be losing my touch. I'm a copper, I should know things. On top of that, I like to think of myself as part of the East Lothian community.

'Yet Alec Smith, an old acquaintance and colleague, lived in the middle of it for… What? Three years, you say… and I hadn't a bloody clue.'

The Head of CID glanced at him, surprised. 'I didn't know that you and DCI Smith were pals.'

'Well, sort of. He played football with my Thursday night crowd for a few years, before his right knee gave out on him. He lived out Pencaitland way in those days, with his wife. She did a runner, though, a year or two before Alec packed it in. Went off with a plumber, or something. I guess he must have moved here in the aftermath of that.' Skinner paused. 'There were a couple of kids, son and daughter; they'll probably be well into their twenties by now. He lived here alone, you said?'

'That's what the voters' register says. We'll see if the door-to-door tells us anything about lady-friends — not that this murder was your run-of-the-mill domestic'

'No indeed. Better let me see where it happened, then.'

Another uniformed constable, so new in the force that Skinner did not know his name, was stationed at Alec Smith's front door. He stood to attention as the unmistakable figure of the Deputy Chief Constable approached. 'Morning, son,' Skinner said. 'This is a bloody awful job you've got: doorkeeper at a slaughterhouse. But I've done it in my time and so has Mr Martin. Just don't let the gawpers gather at the gate. The same goes for the press over there, and for the television crews when they turn up… as they will. This is a narrow street and the traffic comes whizzing round that bend sometimes. We don't want another body here, if we can help it.'

'Very good, sir,' the young man replied, put at his ease by the DCC's friendly manner.

'Who's in there?' asked Martin.

'No one, sir. They're all round the corner at the mobile HQ.'

'Then why's the front door open?'

'Inspector Dorward said to leave it open, sir. To blow the smell out of the place, he said.' Skinner winced, as he stood aside to let Martin lead the way into the house.

Even after Dorward's crew of technicians had done their work, the room upstairs still seemed relatively tidy, considering what had happened there. The slatted blinds were closed once more, but the windows had been opened and they were blowing up and rattling on the through draught. In spite of it all, some of the stench from the night before crept back into the Head of CID's nostrils.

Smith's clothes still lay across the armchair, where the killers had left them. A blue velvet drape still lay across the back of the sofa. The whisky bottle and glasses were still on the table, and the telescope was still on its stand, although they had all been dusted with white fingerprint powder. The cameras were gone from the desk, though, taken away by Dorward as ordered. The only other thing missing from the room since Martin's first visit was the body itself.

Its presence lingered nonetheless. Directly below the hook in the roof beam from which it had hung, a dark stain disfigured the beige carpet.

"The room was like this when you were here last night?' Skinner asked.

'Yes. No signs of a struggle, as you can see. I guess that Alec must have known the guys.'

'Guys?'

'There must have been more than one, surely, to handle a big, rough bloke like him with no obvious effort.'

'Aye, but you said that he was battered about the head. Couldn't a single bloke have slugged him from behind, knocked him unconscious, then strung him up?'

Martin frowned. 'He could have, but if it had happened that way, then almost certainly there would have been blood spattered around. I don't see any. I reckon he must have been overpowered, and that would have taken more than one guy.'

The older man grunted. 'Knowing Alec Smith, age fifty plus or not, I can promise you that it would have taken a small fucking army to overpower him, strip him, tie him and hoist him up on that hook. No, somehow or other he must have been knocked unconscious.'

'That's something else Sarah will have to tell us, then,' the DCS murmured.

Skinner looked around the room: at the expensive, carefully-placed furniture, television and video; the tall lamp in the far corner; the lap-top computer on the desk; the bookshelves built in to the back wall; the ornaments on the desk, table and wide window sills.

'Yes, very neat, very tidy was the late Mr Smith.'

'Was he like that as a copper too?'

'He sure was. A very capable detective. Of the last generation rather than ours, I'd say, but a meticulous, careful operator.'

'Why did he pack it in?'

'Money, he said. He took the pension and went to a bloody good private-sector job. I guess too that he knew he had peaked at DCI.'

'But if he was as capable as all that…?'

'I wouldn't have promoted him, though, and that was that. Horses for courses, Andy.' He turned, separated two slats of the billowing blinds and peered out on to the beach. 'Come on. Let's see what's happening in the mobile HQ.'

They left the house, turned right and walked a few yards along the narrow pavement, to the point at which Forth Street opened out on to a broad green area which fringed the beach. The mobile operations centre, a high articulated vehicle, had been stationed on a narrow strip of roadway.

'The weekend sailors will love that,' said Skinner. 'The thing's blocking the launching ramp for dinghies.'

'Tough,' Martin grunted. 'For today they can use the other one, over by the harbour.'

A dozen police officers, some in uniform, some CID, were milling around on the street outside. 'What the hell's this?' the Head of CID asked a blue-jacketed sergeant. 'A crowd scene?'

'We're just waiting for Stevie Steele to allocate addresses for the house-to-house, sir,' the man answered.

'When did DCI Rose leave?'

'She's still here, sir.'

'Jesus, she's been here all night.' Martin climbed the three steps to the door of the mobile HQ and stepped inside.

The van had no windows; even at around nine on a summer morning, it was lit by neon tubes. The light they cast made Maggie Rose look chalk white and emphasised the dark circles under her eyes. She and Detective Sergeant Stevie Steele looked up as the two Commanders entered; they had been leaning over a small desk making up interview sheets into bundles, and attaching them to blue plastic clipboards.

In another corner of the mobile office, Inspector Arthur Dorward and his assistant, Detective Constable Sharma Ghosh, stopped work on their report and stood up.

'Relax, for God's sake,' said Skinner. 'Sit down, Arthur, sit down all of you. Mags, you look puggled. Finish what you and Stevie are doing, give me a run-down, then get off home.'

The DCI frowned. 'I was planning to grab a couple of hours' sleep in the North Berwick office, then get back to look at the results of the door-to-door interviews.'

'You can't drive yourself that hard, for God's sake. If Brian Mackie was here, you and he would be splitting rest periods.'

'But he isn't here, boss. Look, is this a divisional investigation or are you and the DCS taking over command?'

Skinner raised a hand. 'Hey, I'm little more than a spectator here.'

Beside him, Martin shook his head. 'You're in charge, Maggie. We're here to offer help and support, that's all.'

'Very good. Then I'll do it my way.' She smiled; a thin, half-grin. 'Besides, I've co-opted my husband. Mario says that since his weekend's buggered anyway, he might as well come out to help.'

'That's not inappropriate,' Skinner murmured. 'He's Head of Special Branch, the job Alec Smith used to hold. We may need his input from that angle before we're done with this one. Okay, you two finish up, while we talk to Arthur.'

He and the Head of CID crossed the room to Dorward's table, which was larger than the other. It was piled with papers and notebooks, and in one corner sat a television monitor, connected by a cable to the dead man's video camcorder.

'What did you find in the house, Arthur, apart from that?' asked Martin.

'Nothing I didn't expect to find, sir. Loads of the victim's fingerprints… we lifted them for comparison before the body was taken away. There was another set too, all over the house, but I wouldn't get too excited about that. They were at their heaviest in the kitchen, and we found some on the Domestos and Flash bottles and on the Hoover, so my best guess is that he had a cleaning lady.

'The front door was unlocked, and there was a good palm print on the outside. I'm guessing that it might belong to the guy who found the body.'

'Whatever happened to Alec's dog?' The Head of CID murmured.

'It's at North Berwick nick,' Rose answered. 'When we arrived it wouldn't let anyone near the body, so a couple of the boys took it away.'

'I'm sure we'll find it a home,' said Skinner. 'What else, Arthur? No obvious weapon?'

'Only one, sir. There were plenty of objects that could have been used to inflict the head injuries — there's a whole range of tools down in the cellar — but they were all absolutely clean. We did find a blowlamp, down there, but there's no chance that it was the one used on Mr Smith. It was stone cold and it had a full gas-fuel cylinder. The cellar door was open too, sir. It was very slightly ajar and there were footprints leading to the ladder that goes down to the beach. It looks as if that was the perpetrators' exit route, right enough.' 'I take it we're-'

Rose read the DCC's mind. 'I had uniformed officers begin a search of the beach as soon as the light was good enough, Boss. The trouble is, though, there was a high tide last night, so if the killer did discard something, he probably threw it in the sea. It might be difficult to definitely tie anything we do find to Alec's house.'

Skinner grunted agreement, then looked at the scene-of-crime inspector. 'Write up a provisional report as quick as you can, Arthur, and let DCI Rose have it.'

Martin pointed to the camcorder. 'You played that back yet?'

'No fear, sir,' said the Inspector. 'That quick look through the viewfinder was bad enough; I've got no wish to see it blown up. I'll only watch that again if you order me to.' He paused. 'Oh, by the way, there was nothing on the still camera, other than pictures of wee boats sailing in the bay out there. I've told the lab to print them anyway, but there'll be bugger all in them for us.'

Skinner tapped the pile of papers on the desk. 'There may well turn out to be bugger all in these too, but we'll still have to go through them.' He turned back to Rose. 'This is something your old man could do, Mags. If Alec hung on to any of his old SB contacts, Mario might recognise the names.

'Arthur, you'd better go for a walk on the beach now. DC Ghosh, you're excused too. The front-line officers are going to have to look at that video now.' Dorward and his assistant looked at him gratefully and headed for the exit. For a moment, Skinner thought about following them; instead he switched on the monitor, picked up the camera, found the 'play' button and pressed it. Rose and Steele crossed the room to stand between him and Martin.

For around ten seconds a scrambled image appeared on the screen, until it turned to black. Then gradually a picture appeared; Alec Smith, hanging, naked, from his hook. His mouth was covered by the brown tape, but his eyes were blazing with fury. Skinner used the remote to turn up the volume, and the room filled with the sound of the trussed-up ex-detective cursing unintelligibly behind his gag.

'No blood,' said Martin. 'The head wounds aren't there at this stage. So how the hell did they get him up there?'

Suddenly, out of shot, they heard a click, followed by a soft hiss, which mutated into a husky roar. As they watched the look in Smith's eyes changed from belligerence to terror, as the nozzle of a blowtorch appeared in shot.

'The same person.' Rose's voice was almost matter-of-fact, but a slight tremor gave away her horror. 'It's the same person holding both the camera and the blowlamp.'

'Look for shadows,' Martin whispered. 'Anything, any sign of anyone else coming into shot.'

But all they saw was a hand in a red rubber glove, with a long cuff, gripping the roaring torch as it moved towards Smith. 'How tall do you think the person holding the…' Steele began, but his voice tailed into a gasp as the white flame seared against the helpless man's penis. The twisting victim's eyes bulged, threatening to come out of their sockets. His shouts became an awful, muffled scream. His back arched as he tried to pull away from his torturer, but he had been hauled so high up on his toes that he was completely helpless.

'Try not to look at him,' Skinner barked, urgently. 'Look for the killer instead, listen for him; any sights, any sounds that aren't Alec'

He tried to follow his own instruction, but it was virtually impossible in the face of the most awful horror movie any of them had ever seen. The blowlamp did its work on the genitals, charring, scorching, blackening, then moved up to the nipples, the heat melting Smith's chest hair. Finally, Skinner looked away as the lance of flame aimed for the eyes. He tried to shut his ears against the awful noise. There was a scrambling beside him, Stevie Steele heading for the door, yet no other sound, only Smith's choking screams, rising to a crescendo, then gradually, weakening and fading. Then the roar of the flame dying away, replaced by another noise, a rending, tearing sound, and by one last muted howl from the doomed man on the hook.

At last, Andy Martin pressed the remote to switch off the monitor. 'My God,' Maggie Rose whispered, over and over again, until a sob forced its way out. Skinner leaned on the table, grasping it almost hard enough to splinter the wood, staring once again at the empty screen, listening to the hum as the camcorder continued to replay its tape.

'No other officer is to see that recording,' he ordered. 'Chief Inspector, I want you to take personal charge of it. Take it back to Haddington when next you go there, and lock it in your safe.' He turned to look at her with a gleam in his eyes that she would rather not have seen. Two people had; they were both dead.

'When we arrest this beast, Maggie,' he said, grinding the words through his teeth, 'you'll have to interview him. But not alone; with Brian, if he's back by then. If not, with someone other than one of us, someone who hasn't seen that. I don't know about you, but if I caught the people who did that right now, I'd have a hell of a job keeping my hands off them… I don't think I'd even try.'

Martin's voice broke the silence. 'There was nothing on it to help us catch them,' he muttered. 'Mags was right, the killer held the camera while he did that stuff to Alec. There's not a sign of anyone, not a sound… and no indication that there was more than one person in the room.'

'What a terrible person, though.' The DCC looked at his colleagues, as Stevie Steele came back into the van, sheepishly. 'What the hell could Alec Smith have done for someone to do that to him?'

'Like I said to Karen,' Andy Martin murmured, 'that sort of mind doesn't necessarily need to have a reason.'

'Don't say that, for fuck's sake!' said Skinner, urgently. 'If that's true, he might do it again!

'I don't need to say it, people, but I will. All the stops! Maggie, what are you doing about the press?'

The DCI glanced at her watch. 'Alan Royston's issuing a statement around now, up in Edinburgh. I'll take a press conference once we've done the initial door-to-door sweep.'

'Where?'

'Here, if can find a suitable room. I'll try the community centre.'

'Fine. You get that rest now; if you want me to see the press with you, you only have to ask. But first of all, I've got to tell the Chief Constable what's happened here.'

He caught her glance. 'Don't worry,' he reassured her. 'I'll tell him he's not seeing the video. Jimmy's made a good recovery from his heart attack, but I doubt if he's up to that.'