Gallery Whispers

87

Neil Mcllhenney's in-tray was empty; he had worked his way through the papers which the DCC had referred to him for action or comment.

He had finished an analysis of the relative clear-up rates, category by category, by each of the CID divisions. As he waited for Skinner's Monday morning summons he sat hunched over the desk in his small office, staring out of the window.

He had done a lot of staring, out of many windows, over the last couple of months, he realised. Almost invariably he thought of sunny days to come, of he and Olive, Lauren and Spence, enjoying a normal lifestyle once again. No decisions were being forced upon them by the education authority, but Olive knew that even if she won complete remission from her illness, her classroom days were over.

They had discussed the respective merits of her accepting an offer to switch to the expanding quality control side of education, or of her resigning and setting up in business as a designer of computer-based teaching packages. Whichever option they chose, Neil understood that in reality it was another target to be pursued, another piece of the scaffolding which underpinned his wife's tremendous determination to beat her enemy.

Deacey Simmers was the most important part of that support structure. And Neil knew exactly why Bob Skinner had excluded him from his meeting that morning with Brian Mackie and that tactless bampot Clan Pringle: it was because Simmers was the only item on the agenda. As he stared out into the crisp winter morning, he could picture the three of them grouped around the DCC's desk, the big man doing his trick of watching the driveway, seemingly far away, while absorbing every word that was being said to him.

He was expecting it, but when the phone on his desk buzzed twice, he jumped nonetheless. He knew the signal, so he let it lie unanswered, rising instead and walking out into the corridor, past Ruthie McConnell's rabbit-hutch, as she called it, to Skinner's office.

The red light outside was shining, but he opened the door and stepped in. Pringle and Mackie had gone.

'Sit on the comfy ones,' his boss said, pointing to the informal seating in the corner as he filled two coffee mugs. 'I know, I know,' he muttered as he poured, 'must cut down on his tar, but what's the alternative. Tea? A right poofter's drink that.'

Mcllhenney slumped into one of the low chairs, took two coasters from a container and tossed them onto the rosewood table to protect it from the heat. 'Meeting go all right, sir?' He tried to sound casual, but failed.

'You won't think so, I'm afraid,' Skinner replied, quietly, as he set down the two coffees. 'Clan and Brian brought their lab results with them. Simmers' saliva swab matches the trace that Arthur Dorward's lot found on a glass at the scene of Gaynor Weston's death. Also, his prints were on the envelope of the letter Gaynor sent to her son.

'When the lads interviewed him last week, he admitted to them that he and she had been on intimate terms, let's say. But he said that the last time he saw her was more than two weeks before her death.

On top of that, it turns out that he was a near neighbour of the man Murray, and called in on him quite regularly.

'I can't take that lightly, Neil. It looks bad for your friend.'

'Shit!' Mcllhenney hissed, his mouth tight set. 'Still, boss, if he twigged the position he might be in, we can allow him one wee lie, can't we?'

'He still has to be asked about it, though. Mackie and Pringle have asked me to allow them to pick him up for a formal interview,' Skinner continued. 'They also want a warrant to search his house and his office for traces ofdiamorphine, and any other incriminating material.

Inevitably the hospital will have to know that he's under investigation in connection with the deaths of two patients — there's no evidence left in the Bathgate case.

'You know what that will mean.'

'Sure. Even if we don't charge him straight away, he'll be suspended.'

'Right. But I have to tell you this; on the basis of the evidence I have before me, his loving relationship with the dead woman, his presence in her house that night, his ready access to Anthony Murray; with all that allied to his professional skills, all my training and experience makes me believe, objectively, that he's guilty.'

The DCC looked at his assistant, almost helplessly. 'Neil,' he asked.

'In my place, faced with all this what would you do?'

Mcllhenney smiled. 'Boss, you were right about me. I'm out of the same mould as Superintendent Pringle. If this was just an ordinary case and I was on it, the suspect would be sitting in St Leonard's right now, with a tape running and me shouting in his fucking ear.

'But it isn't an ordinary case. And my wife's life is at stake here, so don't ask me for objectivity.'

The big sergeant looked his boss in the eye. 'I've been thinking about this for the last week, boss, since Deacey's name came up in this thing, and I can tell you it's bloody complex. It seems to me that you're telling me that you see him as a man who believes that he can exercise power over life and death, and square it with his conscience.'

Skinner frowned, then nodded. 'I suppose I am,' he agreed.

'Well I have to tell you… and I have hellish difficulty saying it, because it makes me face up to something I'd rather avoid… but Deacey Simmers' greatest pain comes from the knowledge that he doesn't have that power.

'People in his care, people like Olive and me, we sit in his room and we listen to his words. They come in perfect order; words like inoperable, incurable, palliative and so on. We're literate; objectively we know what they mean. But subjectively, that's another matter.

They're very precise those words, yet no way do they apply to Olive.

'Even now as I sit here, I will not admit to you or anyone else… and most of all I will not admit to me… that she's going to die.

Deacey Simmers, though; from the outset he's told us that her disease indicates that she is. He's laid those words out for us. Then he's said;

"Okay, now these are the treatments I have to offer. You will have them; then what happens is up to you and up to fate." 'Deacey is a caring person, an inspiring person, and he's totally helpless in the face of many of the cases that are sent to him. Everyone who goes into his room gets the plain unvarnished truth, and yet he manages to send people out of there with feelings of determination, and flowing from that, hope against hope. He will never slam the door on anyone.

'If you're saying that this man imagines that he has life-determining power and that he interprets that as allowing him to put people to sleep, then with the greatest respect, boss, and for the first and last time in my life, I have to tell you that you're talking bollocks.

'Deacey knows better that anyone that for my Olive, and all the others like her, his treatments have the same chance of success as a snowball has of putting out a furnace. Yet even in the absence of that power which you say he's perverting, he gives us something; a sense of purpose which makes our situation bearable. He helps us to focus on that one chance in twenty.

'No way did he kill Gay Weston or anyone else. I'll tell you this too. Behind that calm facade of his he's lonely and fragile, and I get the feeling that sometimes he's overcome by what he does; yet he carries on, and that's what makes him what he is: a great man.

'You let those two arrest him, boss, let the Fiscal charge him, and I'll promise you this. When he comes to trial I'll go into the witness box and give evidence in his support, even it I have to leave the force to do it.'

Skinner reached out and put a hand on his assistant's shoulder.

'Neil, if it comes to it, you can speak for him with my public blessing.

But let's see if we can avoid that.

'It seems as if all of my best people have had a finger in this investigation at some time or another… except for you. The papers in these two cases are on my desk; take them away with you and see if you can come up with another suspect. I've told Clan and Brian to sit on their hands for another week. That's how long you've got.

'Maybe you'll turn out to be as important to Mr Simmers as he is to you.'

There are those who believe that the Edinburgh International Conference Centre is one of the finest pieces of late twentieth century architecture in Scotland. There are others who believe that the great drum-shaped building is a blight on the skyline of the capital city.

Andy Martin did not regard himself as a philistine, yet he was a confirmed subscriber to the latter view.

A constable in uniform checked the Head ofCID's warrant card as he pulled up at the car park entrance, looking at it studiously before waving him on. He knew the chief superintendent well enough, but ACC Elder was on the prowl and he had no wish to start the week badly.

Martin strode out of the car park and into the Centre. In the foyer area twin lines had formed as the delegates queued to have their briefcases searched and to pass through the metal detector gateways.

The policeman walked past the lines and round the barrier. He was not carrying a firearm, but nevertheless he wore a gold eagle badge as a short-cut into the hall, since everyone without one was subject to the security check.

Mario McGuire stood at the wide doorway of the main auditorium, looking across its expanse. 'Morning sir,' he called out. 'Come for a look at the sardine tin, have you? God alone knows how they managed it, but they did. We've got thirty-six delegations crammed in here.'

'What's today's programme?' asked Martin.

'Officials only; finalising the agenda and order of speakers for when the big boys get here.'

'Are the delegations limited in size?'

'Yes, the class two nations, judged by GDP, can have four delegates in the hall at any one time; class one nations are allowed eight.'

'Has the seating plan worked out all right?'

The inspector flashed a smile. 'They managed to do it alphabetically, just,' he said. 'I wouldn't fancy being one of the Irish delegation though. They're the meat in the sandwich between Iran and Israel.'

'That's okay,' Martin grunted. 'My granny's Irish. Once that lot start talking the rest won't get a word in. Any other awkward neighbours?'

'I don't know how the Russians and the Saudis are going to get on.'

'No problem, the Russians will be on their best behaviour… otherwise the Saudis might not buy them lunch.'

'Then there's the UK and the US.'

'We're still on buddy terms, I believe. Cigars aren't allowed in the hall, are they?'

McGuire looked at him. 'You're in a chirpy mood today, sir.'

The Head of CID grinned. 'I had a drink with Karen Neville the other night. It did me good; it made me realise that if I go around being a miserable bastard all the time the only person who'll be the worse for it will be me. So I'm trying to find the old Andy again. He's around somewhere; I spent the weekend going through my address book looking for him.'

'D'you not fancy the boss's secretary?'

'Ruthie McConnell? Don't we all? She's living with someone, though.'

The Special Branch commander shook his head. 'Not any more.

Karen says she's chucked him. She's plugged into all the gossip, is that one.'

'I'll bear that in mind. About Karen, I mean; I must be careful what I say around her. As for Ruthie, she's a bit too close to the Big Man for me… in spite of those legs.'

McGuire shot him a sideways look. 'Listen, sir, take some man-toman advice, will you: don't rebound too far in the other direction. The old Andy was always a bit of a myth, wasn't he?'

'A legend in his own bedtime, you mean? Aye, he was…' He laughed. '… to an extent. Thanks Mario, I'll bear that in mind too.'

He glanced into the hall once more, and pointed to a wheelchairbound figure to the left of centre of the seated area. 'I take it that's Karen's boyfriend's pal.'

'Dennis Crombie? Aye, that's him; a dour bugger he is too.'

'So would you be if you had to be lifted on and off the crapper all the time. Is the Wayne fellow around?'

'He was here earlier, when he brought Dennis in. He's probably gone for a coffee. It's about that time.'

'Not with Neville, I hope. Not here.'

'I doubt it. She's on duty frisking the female delegates.'

Andy Martin's grin seemed to McGuire like a throwback. 'I think I'll go and help her,' he said.