Fatal Last Words

Seventy-seven

‘How long does the pathologist reckon he’s been dead?’ McIlhenney asked, speaking to the air, in the driving seat of Skinner’s car as he parked it in Ann Street.

‘She’s estimating time of death at between eight and nine this morning,’ Sammy Pye told him though the hands-free speaker. ‘There’s a box of cornflakes, an unused bowl and a carton of milk on the kitchen table. It looks as if the guy was about to have his breakfast when he was interrupted. There are no signs of forced entry; the door was unlocked, and we were able to walk right in.’

‘Any signs of a struggle?’

‘None. It looks as if Collins knew the caller, let him in. From the head wound. . caused by a blow hard enough to stun but not kill. . the guy hit him with something, knocked him out and then skewered him with the sword.’

‘Did he bring it with him?’

‘We don’t know, not yet. He could have; it’s a wakizashi. .’

‘A what?’

‘Short sword,’ said the chief constable.

‘That’s right,’ the DI confirmed. ‘I’ve got Ray to thank for that; he’s studied Japanese martial arts. Wakizashi’s the name for a short sword, no more than two feet long, the samurai equivalent of a sidearm. It could easily have been hidden under a jacket if it was brought here. We’ll need to ask Carol Glover, or somebody else who knew Collins and who’s been here, before we’ll know for sure. All I can say is that it’s the sort of weapon you’d expect to find displayed on a wall or on a cabinet, and we haven’t found any empty hooks or stands.’

‘What are you doing about Carol?’

‘I’ve sent Alice Cowan to break the news; the poor lass knows her, so it’s probably best.’

‘Yes, fine,’ McIlhenney agreed. ‘What do we know about Collins’ family?’

‘Next to bugger-all. There are a couple of photographs on his sideboard. One’s of him and Carol, taken at a formal dance, and the other’s a graduation photo, taken at what looks like Glasgow University, with him in a gown, and with a middle-aged couple who could be parents. Again, Carol should be able to help us with that. I hope so. I don’t fancy having to ask her to make another trip to the city mortuary to look at a loved one on a slab.’

‘I wouldn’t fancy asking anyone to do that job,’ said Skinner, ‘but you’re right. Even if the parents aren’t available, you should get somebody else to do it rather than her. Xavi Aislado, the victim’s editor; he’d be acceptable. When he learns that one of his people was doing homers for a murderer, he’ll probably be happy to see him dead. . or as happy as Xavi ever gets, at any rate. That reminds me, indirectly; what progress have you made on tracing those payments into Collins’ account?’

‘I think we’ve got as far as we’re going to get, sir. The payments. . twelve grand in total. . have come from a numbered account in a bank in Luxembourg.’

‘Damn it. You’re right, Sammy, we’re stuffed. It’s against their law to disclose account information, even to us, unless we can show clear evidence of money laundering, which in this case we can’t. It’s a pity; anything that would have reinforced the link between Coben and Collins would have been useful.’ He paused, looking at the microphone. ‘Hey,’ he exclaimed, ‘the pen that was dropped beside the body: have you touched it?’

‘No, sir, I couldn’t stand the grief that Dorward would give me if I did. It’s still on the floor; I’m looking at it now.’

‘Then look a bit closer, and see if it tells us anything. Touch it if necessary; I’ll clear you with Arthur.’

He waited, with McIlhenney, in silence for a few seconds.

‘Yes, sir, it does,’ said Pye at last. ‘I had to roll it over to see it, but there’s something on it. It’s a hotel pen, the kind you find in your room, with the stationery. It’s from the Novotel World Forum, The Hague.’

‘Good,’ the chief constable declared. ‘Your next step is to find out from Aislado and from Carol Glover whether Collins has ever been to The Hague, for a football game or on holiday. If not, then there’s a better than even chance that our Mr Coben has. Let Superintendent McIlhenney know as soon as you can. Meantime, he and I have an appointment with a judge.’

‘Before you go, sir,’ Pye said hurriedly. ‘We haven’t got to the bad news yet.’

Skinner frowned. ‘Then get to it,’ he said tersely.

‘Ray and I have done a quick search of Collins’ flat. Not touching, not moving, just looking. There’s only one bedroom, and in his wardrobe we found a blazer, with a Union Jack lapel badge. In a pocket we found a pair of gold-rimmed glasses, bought from Boots, light-reactive, minimum strength. And in the bathroom, in his cabinet, we found an aerosol: hair styling foam for men. When we met Collins, his hair was loose, just like it is now. Then there’s a photo, of him and Carol at a dance, framed on the sideboard. There’s a date on it, in the corner; it was taken the Saturday before last, two days before the cigars were bought. The guy’s got a beard in it. Sir-’

‘Stop, Sammy,’ McIlhenney sighed. ‘We get the picture. It wasn’t Coben who bought the La Gloria cigars, or went to see Andy. It was his message boy, Ed Collins.’

‘OK,’ said Skinner briskly. ‘We know this man is smart. We shouldn’t be surprised by this. Now we really have to go.’

He ended the call and stepped out of the car with his colleague. As McIlhenney tossed him the keys, a perspiring traffic warden rushed towards them, ticket machine in hand. The superintendent whispered in his ear; he turned and shuffled off, with undisguised disappointment.

Lord Elmore was waiting in his open doorway as they walked up his drive. ‘I wish I could do that,’ he said smiling, extending his hand to Skinner.

‘Hello, Claus,’ said the chief constable. ‘We don’t normally pull that stunt; only when it’s necessary. It’s good to see you. How’s The Hague?’

The little judge reflected on the question as he ushered his visitors inside, and up the stairs to his study. ‘Not as varied as the Court of Session or the High Court of Justiciary,’ he confessed as he closed the door behind him, ‘and completely lacking the black humour that you find there, particularly on the criminal bench. But that wouldn’t be appropriate, would it? The cases that we have to try are usually brutal; very harrowing crimes, and atrocities. I don’t know what I did to upset the Lord President who recommended me for appointment to the Tribunal, but whatever it was, he got his own back.’

‘I know,’ Skinner told him. ‘You ruffled plenty of feathers in your time, Claus, both as counsel and on the bench; you were bound to cross the wrong bloke eventually. Don’t blame the Lord President; it had very little to do with him. Your views on the relationship between the judges and politics didn’t go down well with a certain ex-First Minister.’

‘Little Mr Murtagh, now fallen in disgrace? Yes, I was aware his dirty little hand was in it somewhere.’

‘All over it; he pulled all the strings.’

Lord Elmore smiled. ‘In that case, he’d be frustrated to know that although it’s grim, and I’ll be happy to retire when my stint is over, I feel privileged to be doing the job. Can I offer you a drink?’ he asked abruptly.

‘Something soft if you have it.’

‘Superintendent?’

‘The same for me, please.’

The officers took seats and watched as their host poured lime juice into two glasses, then topped them up with soda water from an old-fashioned siphon. ‘Now, chaps,’ he said as he handed them over, ‘what can I do for you? Have you got something on our friend Anderson after all?’

Skinner shook his head. ‘He’s off the pitch. Bruce is a fool, and the worst sort of politician, but in the rest of his life he’s well-intentioned, it seems. No, Claus, we’ve just come from a meeting with a man, someone you don’t know and never will, who says that you’re the man to ask about a certain General Bogdan Tadic; Serbian.’

Lord Elmore stared at him in astonishment. ‘Why in God’s name would you want to know about him?’ he exclaimed.

‘His name’s come up in connection with a suspect in the deaths of Ainsley Glover and Henry Mount.’

‘Then if I didn’t know that the swine is behind some very thick solid bars indeed, I’d tell you to look no further. Of all the sordid villains my colleagues and I have tried, he’s the one who made my blood run the coldest. Absolutely ruthless; a pure psychopath, surrounded by other pure psychopaths who did his bidding.’

‘We know Tadic isn’t in circulation. It’s one of those associates we’re concerned about, someone called Coben.’

‘Coben?’ The judge’s forehead wrinkled in concentration. ‘Coben? Yes, there was a person of that name in his circle, mentioned in the passing by a couple of witnesses. But the stories they told were second-hand, no more than legends. Frankie Coben was said to have carried out some of Tadic’s more sadistic orders, those that he delegated, for the general was very hands on. . hands, feet, teeth, prick, knives, you name it, he used it on his victims. The evidence put before us was that Coben was much less crude that Tadic. . indeed was his cultural antithesis. . but capable of equal, if more sophisticated, violence.’ He paused. ‘In fact, I recall a story that was told during the trial. It was second-hand, so ultimately useless as evidence, but interesting nonetheless. Tadic ordered Coben to get rid of one of his own people he suspected of disloyalty. So the unfortunate was sent out with a mine, with orders to plant it under some enemy fortifications. But just as the man was setting about his task, Coben detonated the thing, using a remote trigger. The witness at the trial said the tale was that when the explosion was heard, Coben laughed and said, “Hoist by his own petard.” So, not just a murderer, Coben was a Shakespearean scholar, with a black sense of humour.’ Lord Elmore gazed at Skinner. ‘But it’s all academic, so to speak, isn’t it? Coben’s dead, killed by the Americans when they missed Tadic.’

‘So they say,’ the chief constable replied, ‘but the name keeps cropping up in this inquiry.’

‘It can’t be the same person. And if it was, what possible interest would someone like Coben have in two crime writers?’

‘We can’t answer that yet; that’s why we’re here. Claus, what can you tell us about Tadic’s trial?’

‘We’re going to have to do it again,’ the judge glowered. ‘That’s the first thing I can tell you. His legal team have won a retrial, courtesy of an obscure blunder by the prosecution in preparing its case. We’re going to have to uproot the witnesses from wherever they’ve been resettled.’

‘All of them?’ McIlhenney exclaimed. ‘Isn’t their evidence on the record?’

‘Yes, but we reckon that we’ll have to recall at least one of them, the key witness, who saw Tadic kill seven people, personally.’

‘Can you remember his name?’ the superintendent asked.

‘Of course; I remember the whole trial, vividly, all the awful stories. His name was Mirko Andelić. He and two others were in hiding when Tadic and his men went on the rampage; all three saw him go into a building. Mirko got to a window and saw him. .’ he drew a breath, ‘. . do it. He gutted them all with a sharpened sickle, one by one, four men and three women. . another piece from the Bard, by the way, maybe suggested by Coben. The wounds matched those on bodies found well after the event, by NATO forces. At least the other witnesses didn’t get to see that. One of them was Mirko’s wife, Danica; the other was her brother, Aca something.’

‘Nicolić?’

Lord Elmore stared at Skinner. ‘Yes, that’s it. How did you know that?’

‘The names you’ve just mentioned were all on a list compiled by Ainsley Glover.’

‘Jesus, how did he get those?’

‘No idea, but why does it surprise you that he did?’

‘Because the trial was held in camera, at the request of the American government. They didn’t want attention to focus on their attempt to assassinate Tadic. Besides Frankie Coben, there were many civilian casualties; their action could be construed as a war crime itself.’ He hesitated, thinking. ‘So what the hell was Glover up to?’

‘Glover and Mount. We know they were working on a joint project, perhaps with a third party. It looks now as if they were planning a book on Tadic.’

‘And his secret trial?’

‘I suppose so. It’s pretty clear they were looking for the witnesses.’

‘But where would they get the lead, their names?’

‘Henry Mount was a retired diplomat. Could he have had access?’

‘Oh my. If he had the right contacts in the Foreign Office, indeed he could.’

‘That’s it. They were looking for witnesses, they tripped over Coben and were taken out.’

‘So what’s Coben’s purpose?’

‘I’d been wondering the same thing, Claus, but now it’s obvious, from what you’ve just told us: Coben is looking for the witnesses too, before the retrial can begin.’

‘In that case, Bob, Superintendent, please run the sod to ground!’

‘We will, I promise you.’

‘Is there any other way I can help?’

‘There is one thing,’ McIlhenney responded, ‘something that’s been puzzling my people. Does the term “the cleaner” mean anything to you in this context?’

Lord Elmore thought for second, then his eyes flashed. ‘Not “the cleaner”. No, someone’s misunderstood. It should be “the cleanser”, as in ethnic. The Serbian word is čistač, and that’s how it translates best. It was Tadic’s nickname in Yugoslavia.’