Saints of the Shadow Bible

15

‘The bullet is undergoing analysis,’ Siobhan Clarke announced to her team. They were gathered around her in an open-plan office on the first floor of Wester Hailes police station. There was a bit less room than any of them would have liked — competition had been fierce for the few comfortable-looking chairs. Hot-desking was necessary and no one had yet found a kettle. There were journalists outside on Dumbryden Drive, but not many. Shootings were rare in Scotland’s capital, but the demise of a minicab driver couldn’t compete with that of a senior politician. Fox didn’t doubt that the foul weather was also a factor. With a new cold front making itself felt, the rain was turning to sleet. And Dumbryden was not exactly salubrious — mesh grilles protected the cop shop’s ground-floor windows — meaning there would be no press conferences in new-build hotels. . not until such hotels were constructed.

‘I can’t tell you a lot more than that at present. It’s a nine-millimetre calibre, probably from a handgun. Pathologist commented that it didn’t look shiny new, but I’m not sure what that tells us. Until Ballistics and Forensics get back to us, therefore, I want to concentrate on the victim’s movements from the night he went missing until he ended up in the canal. He must have eaten — most recent intake comprised a cheese and onion sandwich and a packet of ready-salted crisps, plus a bottle of Irn Bru. .’

‘Sounds like a meal deal,’ Olivia Webster interrupted. ‘Sort of thing a garage or supermarket would sell.’

Clarke sought out Fox. ‘Any receipts among his possessions?’

Fox shook his head. ‘We don’t have his clothes, though — I suppose there could be something in one of the pockets.’

‘Can you check that?’ Clarke asked. Then, to the room at large: ‘We need door-to-door, starting at the locus and radiating out. The industrial estate will be part of that. They’re bound to have camera footage, or else night-time security we can talk to. Shops and petrol stations in the vicinity — get photos of Saunders out there.’

‘Local media?’ someone else asked.

Clarke nodded. ‘Newspapers and internet — TV if we can get it. Putting out a plea for anyone to come forward.’

‘There might be something on his phone,’ Fox said. ‘Doubtful — we already checked once with his mobile phone provider — but worth taking another look.’

Clarke nodded her agreement. ‘Inspector Fox here,’ she explained to the room, ‘has been helping the Solicitor General’s office form a case against William Saunders. Thirty years ago, Mr Saunders was charged with the murder of a man called Douglas Merchant. The case fell apart due to police incompetence. .’

‘Incompetence or collusion,’ Fox corrected her.

‘Anyway,’ Clarke went on, ‘those files will be coming here as soon as I’ve cleared it with Elinor Macari. And as Inspector Fox is the expert, he’ll be the one to answer any questions you might have.’

‘A good starting point,’ Fox added, ‘might be the detectives who were responsible for the collapse of the case against Saunders. One of them, Stefan Gilmour, contacted Saunders by phone. We’ve questioned him once, but now that a murder has been committed. .’

Clarke had been nodding throughout. ‘We’ll bring him in,’ she stated.

‘The Stefan Gilmour?’ someone asked.

‘The only one I know of,’ Clarke confirmed.

Fox was impressed.

Clarke had stamped her authority on the group, giving an immediate sense of order and purpose to the inquiry. There had been room for some levity — just enough so that everyone could relax into their given tasks. Afterwards, she squeezed through the throng towards the desk he was sharing.

‘You’ll get me those files from the Solicitor General?’ she prompted.

‘I’ve put in a call. Waiting for her to respond.’

‘Or we could just go and fetch them. .’

‘Best not to get on the wrong side of her — not this early in the game.’

Clarke seemed to sense the truth of this.

‘I’ll track her down,’ Fox said. ‘You think it ties in, don’t you?’

‘Rule nothing in and nothing out.’

‘I didn’t really glean anything from the widow.’

‘I hope you don’t think I was going easy on you?’

‘I think we both know you really were.’

‘You’d met her before, making you the obvious candidate.’

Fox nodded and decided to drop the subject. ‘It’s good the bullet was found,’ he said.

‘And the casing,’ Olivia Webster interrupted, coming towards them and waving her phone. ‘It was in the water.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Not so far.’

‘Evidence suggests he was sleeping rough,’ Fox said. ‘Maybe not too far from where he ended up.’

‘The industrial estate?’ Clarke suggested. ‘Maybe we should go take a look — as soon as you’ve tried the Solicitor General’s office again.’

For want of anything better to do, Rebus returned to Gayfield Square, where DCI James Page had been left with only a skeleton crew. He was seething, prowling a line from his cupboard-sized office across the floor of the CID room and back again.

‘It’s not that I don’t think Siobhan’s perfectly capable,’ he commented.

‘Agreed,’ Rebus said. ‘Always annoying, though, when the action’s elsewhere.’

Page glowered at him, trying to work out whether sympathy or mockery was being offered. Rebus’s face gave nothing away.

‘I suppose your own little adventure with Malcolm Fox is coming to an abrupt halt?’ Page eventually countered.

‘A few ends to trim off first,’ Rebus lied, checking his watch. ‘In fact, I should get over there and give him a hand. .’

‘So we can expect you back at your desk here bright and early tomorrow?’

‘Of course.’ Rebus gave a little salute before turning to leave.

Outside, he stood in the car park, smoking a cigarette. There were no messages on his phone, and no point in heading to the office at the Sheriff Court — Fox had locked up on their departure, and Rebus hadn’t bothered asking for the key. Instead, he tapped in Stefan Gilmour’s number. It went to an answering machine, so Rebus hung up. But a moment later a text popped up on his screen. It was from Gilmour — In a meeting. I’ve heard about S. Don’t worry.

S for Saunders. What was it Rebus wasn’t supposed to worry about? The threat to all the Saints, or just to Gilmour? Was he saying that he didn’t blame Rebus for the increased attention?

‘Bloody hell, John,’ Rebus muttered to himself as he crushed the remains of the cigarette underfoot.

He got into his Saab and drove to Torphichen Place. The media presence had lessened — maybe they’d heard the results of the autopsy. Inside, DCI Ralph nodded a greeting. He seemed flustered, which probably explained why he didn’t question a stranger’s arrival in his midst. There was a heavy, almost drowsy atmosphere in the office. Rebus recognised it from dozens of previous investigations. Adrenalin and process carried you through the initial stages of an inquiry, but if progress stalled, there came a creeping inertia. All the phone calls had been made, all the interviews conducted. You were going over old ground constantly, for want of anything else to do. Or you headed down unpromising paths which led to dead end after dead end. All of it sapping the strength and the spirit. Especially galling when the team had become fragmented — Rebus sensed that the loss of Clarke and the few others she’d taken with her weighed heavily. Many hours of effort had been expended, and by now, answers were expected. Without them, self-worth would deflate, team morale flag.

One short tour of the main room told Rebus all of this. He headed into a smaller office where a solitary detective constable, jacket over the back of his chair and sleeves rolled up, was working away at a computer. There was a kettle, and Rebus asked if it was all right to make himself a brew.

‘Long as you’ve got a pound for the kitty,’ the young man said.

Rebus nodded, noticing the tin tea caddy with the slot in its top and the word MONEY taped on one side. He switched the kettle on and asked the officer if he wanted anything.

‘My shout.’

‘Coffee, thanks. One sugar, no milk.’

Rebus nodded again and got to work. He sifted through some change from his jacket, then, with back turned, lifted the caddy and gave it a shake, so that its contents rattled, before returning the coins to his pocket.

‘No milk, one sugar,’ he said, placing the mug on the corner of the desk. Then he asked the young man’s name.

‘Alan Drake.’

‘Pleased to meet you.’ Rebus stuck out his hand. ‘I’m John Rebus.’

‘I know.’

‘Probably been warned off talking to me, eh? Big bad wolf and all that.’

‘No, it’s just. . well, everybody knows you.’

‘You can ignore most of what you’ve heard.’ Rebus picked up his mug and scooped the tea bag into a bin.

‘You mentored DI Clarke,’ the young man stated.

‘No one “mentors” Siobhan — all she ever learned from me was what not to do.’ Rebus had come around to the side of the desk, so he could see what Drake was working on.

‘Deceased’s diary,’ the young officer obliged. ‘His office has been helpful. .’

‘The Justice Minister was a busy man,’ Rebus commented. ‘What about the night prior to his death? Have we anything on that?’

‘A rare evening off,’ Drake conceded. ‘Watched a couple of episodes of a TV show called Spiral. Supper from the freezer and some preparatory work for the next day. Replied to a dozen e-mails — personal as well as business — and made a few calls.’

‘I see you’ve got the records.’ Rebus gestured towards the printouts.

Drake nodded. ‘Landline and mobile. I’ve got names for everyone he spoke to or texted.’

‘And they’ve been interviewed?’

‘Sometimes just by phone.’

‘Including this one?’ Rebus tapped a finger against Alice Bell’s name.

‘Shares a flat with the deceased’s son’s girlfriend. She’s studying art history and Mr McCuskey had arranged a tour of the Parliament for her — big collection there, apparently. Have you ever been?’

Rebus nodded slowly. ‘Years back, not long after it opened. Official business, though, I don’t recall seeing any paintings.’ He paused. ‘Any more calls between the two of them?’

‘Three or four over the space of a month.’

‘Setting up the Parliament tour?’

‘That’s right — have you spotted something I missed?’

‘Not at all — seems very thorough,’ Rebus said. ‘And you’ve shown the results to. .?’

‘DCI Ralph. It would have been DI Clarke, only she’s not here.’ Drake looked up at Rebus. ‘They’ve put her in charge of a real murder case.’

‘You never know, son — this might turn into one again.’ Rebus placed his half-empty mug on the nearest window ledge. ‘You just have to keep panning for gold. .’

Rebus spent the rest of the late afternoon in the Central Library on George IV Bridge. A librarian showed him how to use the microfilm reader in the Edinburgh Room. He was interested in the local daily and evening papers for the four weeks leading up to Billy Saunders’s attack on Douglas Merchant. Having been through the police logs, he’d found nothing surprising or out of place — excepting that torn page from the custody ledger. As he spooled each day’s news across the large screen in front of him, he tried not to become distracted; difficult when there were so many reports and stories that triggered memories. Margaret Thatcher was planning a June general election, and Jimmy Savile was fronting an advertising campaign for train travel. Alex Ferguson’s Aberdeen beat Real Madrid in extra time to lift the Cup Winners’ Cup. British Leyland was in trouble, as were Timex and Ravenscraig. There were moves to ban smoking from the upper decks of buses, and Annie was showing at the Playhouse — Rebus remembered Rhona and Sammy dragging him along so he could sleep through it. An ad for a Kensitas gift book reminded him that some of Sammy’s Christmas presents would have come from his cigarette coupons. Meantime, the Balmoral Hotel was still the North British and pirate videos were being seized. He thought he could recall a stash of them doing the rounds at Summerhall — Gandhi a popular choice. A business computer cost almost the same as a new car, and Bowie was due to play Murrayfield. Stefan Gilmour had blagged the Saints into the eventual gig, Rebus watching and listening through a haze of alcohol on a wet, grey June evening. .

On the verge of taking a break and stepping outside for a cigarette, he noticed that the room was emptying, the students unplugging their laptops and packing their bags. Rebus walked across to the desk, and asked what time the place closed.

‘Five,’ he was told.

Giving him only another ten minutes. Instead of the break, he speeded up his reading. He had been doing little more than glancing at each day’s obituaries, concentrating instead on news stories. But then he saw a name he recognised.

Philip Kennedy.

Suddenly but peacefully at home. . Funeral service. . Family flowers only, please. .

Wee Phil Kennedy. Slippery Phil. Rebus thought he remembered Stefan Gilmour at the time brushing his hands together at the news — one more scumbag who wouldn’t be clogging their in-tray. From the date of birth, he calculated that Kennedy had died just shy of his forty-third birthday. Rebus could see his face — pockmarked and florid and freckled. It was the sort of face you used to see in kids’ comics: slightly exaggerated, an overgrown child. Toothy and nervous and bad news. A housebreaker who always carried a knife with him on jobs, scaring the daylights out of anyone he happened to find at home. The elderly and frail a speciality; sheltered housing was never quite sheltered enough from one of Kennedy’s nocturnal visits. He would often follow his victims home from the post office on pension day, scope the place out, and then return later, a balaclava over his face and six inches of blade gripped tight. One woman died of fright, and another fell and broke her hip, leaving her in pain as well as fear for the rest of her days.

Suddenly but peacefully at home. .

Some justice in that, perhaps. He skimmed back a few days, but found no reports of Kennedy’s body being found. Rebus gnawed at his bottom lip. Was it Frazer Spence who had come in one day, a bounce in his step, and announced the news? And had Stefan Gilmour really brushed his hands together, quite content to have heard it? Was Porkbelly Paterson in the office at the time? How had he reacted? Rebus couldn’t remember. But all of them would have pulled Kennedy in for questioning at one time or another, and some of them would have given evidence against him in court. He had passed away six days prior to the attack on Douglas Merchant — their bodies might well have lain in adjacent drawers at the mortuary. Professor Cuttle’s words again: we were so busy. . a lot of lowlifes dropping dead. . Rebus wondered what had happened to Slippery Phil. He could think of one man who might well have the answers. The same man who very probably had sliced him open on a slab. .

It was dark by the time Clarke and Fox arrived at the canal bank, ducking below the crime-scene tape. The rain had finally stopped and the sky was clear, the temperature dropping rapidly. Arc lights had been set up to illuminate the area where the dive team were still searching. The bullet casing had been recovered from the water, but no weapon as yet. From their time in front of various streams of CCTV footage from the businesses based on the industrial estate, they now had a good notion that Saunders had been sleeping in an alley, covered by a roll of felt underlay and some flattened cardboard boxes. In the alley itself they had found scraps and wrappers indicating that he had indeed been eating from a local supermarket — whose CCTV was also now being checked for sightings. His phone had been dried out and was working. Once charged, it showed that he had made no calls, and had received only a few — predominantly from his wife and the Solicitor General’s office, both leaving messages asking him to get in touch.

‘Why didn’t he use it?’ Clarke had asked.

‘Because he was worried it could help trace him?’ Fox had suggested. ‘We have the technology to do that.’

‘You’re saying it was us he was afraid of?’

To which Fox had offered only a non-committal shrug. ‘Before he vanished, he had a call one morning — number withheld, and lasting all of half a minute. I’m guessing that was Stefan Gilmour. Certainly chimes with what Gilmour told Rebus and me.’

‘I need a full report from you, Malcolm — everything you can tell me about Summerhall and Saunders.’

‘Including John Rebus?’

‘Yes. No room for favours here, understood?’

‘Understood. Do you mind me asking something?’

‘What?’

‘Is this your first time in charge of a Major Incident Team?’

‘What if it is?’

‘Nothing — I just want to thank you for making me feel useful.’

‘You’ll be useful once I get that report.’ They were clambering up the bank towards the canal path, but Clarke stopped suddenly, turning to face him. ‘Summerhall was dirty, wasn’t it?’ She watched him nod, his eyes on hers. ‘And John?’

‘I’m not sure,’ he admitted. ‘He might not be implicated at all.’

‘You’re not just saying that because he’s my friend?’

‘We both know Rebus has sailed close to the wind — more times than either of us can count. I’m sure you’ve helped him out of a few jams, as have a lot of his other colleagues down the years, and some of them came to grief. I don’t know what kind of body armour Rebus wears, but it’s done its job up to now. Could be that when he arrived at Summerhall he took with him the idealism of youth. But by the time he left, he’d learned bad lessons.’

‘From Gilmour, Blantyre and Paterson?’

Fox nodded again, and watched as Clarke let out a hissed exhalation between gritted teeth. ‘The question is,’ he asked, ‘how much of all that Saints mumbo-jumbo does he still believe? Is he going to cover up for them?’

‘Misguided loyalty, you mean?’ It was Clarke’s turn to nod. Her phone buzzed and she checked the screen. It was a text from Laura Smith: We’ll call it quits if you brief me on William Saunders.

‘Something important?’ Fox enquired.

‘Absolutely not.’

‘David Galvin?’

Clarke glared at him. ‘He’s history, Malcolm.’

She turned her head sharply, alerted by a cry from the canal. One of the frogmen was standing in the water, which reached only to his chest. He was waving something, a small, dark shape draped with strands of slimy green weed.

‘That looks to me very like a gun,’ Fox commented. Then watched as a relieved smile broke across Siobhan Clarke’s face.