Skinner's Mission

58

‘Quinn. My name is Willie Quinn.’

‘Thanks for coming to see us, Mr Quinn,’ said Andy Martin. The taxi driver nodded a quick, ‘No problem,’ glancing nervously around at the same time. The Chief Superintendent suspected that this man had years of experience of not looking policemen in the eye.

‘For the record, how old are you?’ he asked.

‘Forty-nine.’

‘And your address?’

‘Number ten, Glenfiddich Walk, Southhouse, Edinburgh.’ Martin nodded, imperceptibly, to Neil McIlhenney, standing at the door. Quietly, the big Sergeant slipped out of the room.

‘Who do you drive for, Mr Quinn?’ asked Dave Donaldson, seated beside Martin in the modern airy interview room, directly beneath his office in the St Leonard’s station.

‘Snap Cabs,’ said the small, grey, shifty man.

‘Who’s your boss?’

‘Hard tae say. Ma controller’s a woman called Marilyn Snell, but the guy that collects the money, that’s a Mr Terry.’

‘When you phoned this office, you told an officer that you had information for us about the Carole Charles murder, ’ said Martin. ‘So, what have you got to tell us?’

Willie Quinn shifted uncomfortably in his chair once more, like a man experiencing a culture shock. ‘Last Wednesday, I made a pick-up in Seafield Road. About quarter to nine.’

‘Where, exactly?’

‘Just before the roundabout at the King’s Road. Outside the Balti House.’

‘Okay, go on.’

‘It was a man. Marilyn told me that he’d called because his car had broken down, and he needed a quick pick-up. He had tae be somewhere for nine o’clock.’

‘Can you describe him?’

Quinn screwed up his face, as if the act was an aid to memory. ‘Youngish bloke, in his thirties. He was fairly tall, and light-haired, I think; but mind youse, it was dark, and pissing down.’

‘Anything else?’

‘He wore a big overcoat. Like I said it was raining, so he had the collar turned up.’

‘Where did he ask you to take him?’

‘Tae the Jewel, up across Milton Road, through the roundabout where the tyre place is.’

‘You don’t remember the address.’

Quinn looked sheepish. ‘No. The guy was giving me directions once we got past the roundabout, but I missed a turn. He said that it was okay where we were, then he paid me, got out of the car, and legged it up one of the side streets.’

‘Do you remember what time it was by then?’

‘A couple of minutes before nine.’ Quinn looked over his shoulder as the door opened behind him, and Neil McIlhenney stepped back into the room. He was holding a sheet of paper which he handed to Martin.

‘One thing I don’t get, Willie,’ said the Chief Superintendent, amiably. ‘Why’s it taken you five days to come forward?’

The shifty man shrugged, looking embarrassed. ‘Well, I don’t read the papers much, see. Someone telt me about the murder over the weekend, and I mentioned that pick-up to Marilyn, when I started my shift last night.

‘She came on the radio later on, and said that Mr Terry wanted me to speak tae youse.’

Martin’s green eyes widened. ‘Mr Terry?’ He glanced at the sheet of paper on the desk.

‘D’you always do what Mr Terry asks?’

‘Too right. Not that he asks me for much, mind.’

‘Willie, we’ve done some checking on you since you got here. This says that you have eleven convictions, for theft, housebreaking and shoplifting.’ Quinn’s eyes dropped. ‘You’re not a very honest bloke, are you.’ The man said nothing.

‘So tell me, is your story exactly as it happened, or has Mr Terry embroidered it for you in any way?’

‘No!’ The voice rose. ‘What I told you, that’s just how it was, like. Honest.’

Martin smiled at this final assurance. ‘Okay. When you were in Seafield Road, do you remember seeing anything else?’

Quinn’s eyes narrowed again as if from the effort of racking his brain. ‘As I was pulling away a big fire engine came tearing round the corner, heading in the other direction. That was all.’

Martin nodded. ‘Nothing else?’

‘No.’

‘Right, I want you to wait here with the two Constables and set down what you’ve told us as a formal written statement. Once it’s been typed up and you’ve signed it, you can go.’

He stood up and strode out of the room, followed by Donaldson and McIlhenney. ‘Yours, Dave,’ he said, heading for the stairs.

‘What do you think of that?’ he asked, as the door of the Superintendent’s office closed behind them.

‘It’d be a first all right,’ drawled McIlhenney. ‘A murderer making his getaway in a minicab owned by the intended victim.’

‘Sure,’ said Donaldson, ‘but what if his car really did break down?’

‘Then he’d hardly have buggered off and left it at the scene, sir. Unless it was stolen.’

Donaldson shook his head. ‘Every vehicle in the vicinity of the fire has been accounted for.’

‘After the event,’ said Martin. He looked at McIlhenney. ‘What would your Olive do if your car broke down on a rainy night in Seafield?’

The Sergeant pondered the question. ‘Apart from giving me a severe tongue-lashing, she’d phone the RAC.’

‘And if she’d to be somewhere in a hurry?’

‘She’d tell them where it was, leave the keys in it and get a taxi.’

‘Right. So let’s follow this through. Neil, you and Sammy run a quick check with the motoring organisations, and with the garages around town who do emergency rescue services. See if any of them picked up a car from Seafield Road last Wednesday.

‘If they did, I want to know who owns it and where he lives.’

‘Unless it’s my Olive,’ said McIlhenney.

Martin smiled and shook his head. ‘No, even if it is. I’m ruling no-one out of this investigation!

‘This might not be a hot lead, exactly, but it’s the only one we have and we’ll follow it to the finish.’