Pray for the Dying

Fifty-Seven

‘Welcome back, Detective Inspector,’ Skinner said, with feeling. He jerked his thumb in Provan’s direction. ‘This little bugger’s been intolerable since you’ve been away.’

‘Tell me about it,’ Lottie chuckled. ‘He’s never been off the bloody phone. He’ll be wanting to adopt me next.’

‘Everything’s all right at home, is it?’ Her eyes went somewhere else for a second. ‘Sorry,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s none of my business and if you don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine by me.’

‘Not at all, Chief, not at all,’ she replied. ‘I had a tough couple of days, but I’m okay now. Scott’s living with his brother out in Airdrie. . at least that was the address they gave when he made his court appearance this morning. He turned up at the house again on Saturday, but he was sober, and it was only to collect his clothes.’

‘Did you know that Sergeant. .’

Her nod stopped him in mid-sentence. ‘Yes, I was told. Her husband got himself arrested for thumping her. I’d have put in a word for him if he’d battered Scott, but he must have decided that hitting her was less risky. Maybe she’s with him now. I don’t know and I don’t want to. Jakey’s come to terms with the fact that his dad won’t be back, and that’s all I’m worried about.’

‘Of course,’ Skinner agreed. ‘He’s the most important person involved. Right,’ he exclaimed, ‘if we’re all ready, let me explain to you what this is about.’ He smiled. ‘They thought it was all over. .’ he chuckled. ‘But no, thanks to a large slice of luck, the game may still be on. .’ He rose, stepped over to his desk, and returned holding a laptop, which he laid on the table. ‘. . and those who don’t believe in miracles may like to have a rethink. That, lady and gentleman, is Byron Millbank’s missing MacBook, the place where his wife told Detective Superintendent Payne that he kept his whole life. Normally,’ he continued, ‘there would have been a team of experts huddled over it for a week, trying to work out the password. In this case Byron gave us an unwitting clue, when he said to Mrs Millbank that the chances of getting into it were the same as winning the Lottery.

‘So we had her rummage about among his personal things, and guess what she found? Yup, a payslip for a lottery season ticket.’ He opened the computer to reveal a slip of paper, with six twin-digit numbers noted on it. ‘There you are,’ he said, and slid the slim computer across to Mann.

‘Has anyone looked at it?’ she asked.

‘No, it’s all yours. I want you and that bright young lad Paterson to get into it, and see if you can find anything that doesn’t relate to the dull and fairly uneventful life of Mr Byron Millbank but to the rather more colourful world of Beram Cohen.’

‘What about me, Chief?’ Provan asked, with a hint of a rumble. ‘Am Ah too old for that shite?’

Skinner threw him a sharp look. ‘Almost certainly,’ he said. ‘But as it happens I’ve got something else in mind for you. I want you to get back on to your friends in Mauritius, and find the birth registration of Marina Deschamps. She’s thirty-two years old, so the probability is that it will be a paper record. Birth date, April the ninth, so you’ll know exactly where to look.’

‘Marina Day Champs? The last chief’s sister?’

‘Not quite,’ Skinner corrected him. ‘The last chief’s missing half-sister. There are things I don’t know about that lady, and I want to.’

‘Can Ah no’ just ask her mother?’

‘No chance. You do not go near her mother. Leave that to CTIS, Superintendent Payne’s new team. She says she doesn’t know where her daughter’s gone, but we’re tapping her phone, just in case. Like mother like daughters? You never know.’