Snow Storm

15

Burke was thinking of heading home. It didn’t do, he knew. Higher up heads would doubtless shake in unison at this; murderer or murderers on the loose and the D.I. heading home at what could quite sensibly be called tea time. But higher up heads were often shaken where he was concerned. That was just the way he worked. Sometimes you had to step back from the problem and focus on something else for long enough that the solution might appear in the passing. They said that about magic eye pictures too though, and he’d never been any good at them.

He rubbed his eyes, only to feel them sting more violently. He wasn’t designed for the indoor life. The controlled environment put everything out of whack. In this case the heating system, desperately trying to fend off the effects of the encroaching “big freeze” was overdoing it a bit and causing his head to sweat, which in turn seemed to be melting the moulding clay in his hair causing it to run down his forehead and into his eyes, creating just the right amount of sting and irritation. In summer the air con would dry out his eyes causing the tear film to disappear and make every movement of the eyelids painful. Still, simple linear cause and effect was a thing to behold.

If only the rest of the world was as easy. If only this case, or these cases or indeed whatever the hell it was, could be so easy. And yet it was in a sense, all just one big mathematical equation, cause and effect flowing in many different directions all at once. That was what he loved, hated and got lost in. Like all equations it balanced, made sense. You just had to stand far enough back to get a swatch at the bigger picture.

He stared at the I2 diagrams on the big screen in the meeting room. He remembered the days you had to do this with a board, some pins and a ball of wool. You couldn’t zoom in and out of that or stick it on a slide and email it.

Even chance was an illusion. Burke was a fatalist. They were always going to do what they were always going to do because of background, circumstance, genetics, diet, whatever, and he was always going to lock them up if he could because he needed to solve the puzzle, just as he had to do things in fours when no one was looking. It was pathological. He couldn’t help it any more than he could help deciding to help it because that electrical signal would always take that particular path that offered least resistance though people liked to allow themselves the illusion of free will.

He couldn’t moralise about it. It was just what it was, best treat it as a game, but one he played to win.

He felt his stomach churn and realised he hadn’t eaten since breakfast, electing instead to stave off hunger with caffeine and nicotine, the super model diet. Rachel had recently read an article about people being predisposed to types of addiction due to a lack of dopamine, or was it due to a lack of dopamine receptors in the brain? He forgot. Whatever. He was a third generation addict. It might go back even further but no one was around to say. The previous two generations had expired, though not through their addictions. He was a first generation teetotaller. That was surely something.

He had survived on stimulants for a few years, maintained the svelte physique of an anorexic snake due to being a lazy instant past guzzling single man until the point of meeting Rachel. He probably didn’t realise it but he’d been hungry all along. She filled a void he hadn’t known was there, emotionally but also nutritionally, to the tune of two stone. And now he couldn’t stop. Was it better to die of a heart attack due to fat or stimulants? Either way you got there in the end.

He hedged his bets, ordering a Dominos pizza while inhaling the toxins from his fake fag, just as the mobile buzzed its way along his desktop. Dr Brown’s number was on display as it plummeted over the edge before hitting the floor and separating into its constituent parts.

Brown had decided to stick around for a while, perhaps due to some misplaced sense of duty or perhaps the constant jibes about Mrs Brown had a grain of truth to them.

Burke felt a sense of deja vu on arrival at the morgue, despite the fact it was a lot darker and colder than it had been on his previous visit. He’d cancelled his takeaway, his nose twitching at the prospect of a sliver of new information.

Doc Brown looked haggard, slightly doddery compared to his normal self. It could have been the time of day. He seemed smaller somehow as though he’d wilted as the sun went down or someone had let the air out of his tyres. What was left of his hair stood on end reminding Burke of The Prodigy’s Keith Flint.

He had one and a half specimens under covers on adjoining slabs. Vlad the Inhaler’s head could clearly be seen under one cover and the other it transpired was home to body number two.

“Something was annoying me about our friend Mr Petrovsky,” the good doctor began. “I had some time on my hands. Believe it or not it has actually been a comparatively quiet week given the time of year, so I took some time to mull it over and dig a little deeper.” He uncovered the head which looked to be considerably more shrivelled than previously and gently moved it round to face Burke. “Note the slight abrasions to the nose and forehead. I had discounted them at first if I’m totally honest, thought perhaps they’d happened when the witness dropped him and he hit the pavement.”

“OK,” Burke replied. I’d probably have thought the same.

“You see these marks here?” Brown continued as Burke nodded at the spots on Vlad’s head which had been shaved, revealing more abrasions. “These are actually where he hit the ground. You see? Less like the grazes on the nose and forehead.”

Burke nodded again, wondering where this was going.

“I had my suspicions so I took swabs from the grazes along with samples of the nasal mucus.”

“And?”

“Brick dust.”

“Brick dust? So what, he got his face scraped on a brick wall?”

“He did that. And looking closer at his scalp,” Brown motioned to an area of what was left of Vlad’s hair which lay askew compared with the rest of the direction of growth. “You see how this area is disturbed slightly?”

“Think yours might be like that too after a night like he had.”

“True, what there is of it, but the point is that he’s missing a few hairs in this area.”

“I see, so you think someone held his hair by this point?”

“Now we’re getting there. And what else can we deduce from this information?”

“He was offed by a left hooker,” Burke answered, partly telling himself this. “They had him face first against a brick wall so he got scratched and inhaled some dust. They had to hold the head with the right hand and hack with the left, assuming it was the same person, which I’d say it probably was.”

“Well I don’t think I’d hold his head while you hacked away at it with a machete,” Brown agreed. “Much as I trust your steady hand,” he added pointing at Burkes shaking paw. “Smoke less Jim, exercise more.”

“I’ll try,” Burke agreed, neither meaning it nor taking it too seriously. “Are you able to find out what kind of brick dust it is? Where it comes from possibly?”

“Of course,” Brown replied matter-of-factly, as though the question was scarcely worth the effort of answering. “It’ll take some time though, a couple of days at a civilised time of year, so hopefully we’ll hear before Christmas.”

Burke scoffed a tired laugh. “Anything else?” he asked.

“Regarding the headless henchman, no, but as for this fellow.” He pulled back the second cover revealing the body of the garrotting victim. “We’re still checking for dental records, nothing so far. He has several fillings, all done the expensive way with the white stuff.”

“Everyone’s paranoid about mercury these days. Even yardies eh?”

“Indeed they are, although when it comes to symptoms like memory loss you’d think they should be more worried about twenty first century living and its inherent lack of focus.”

Andy checked the time on his wrist. 21:07. They’d been here for the guts of four hours now and they weren’t too sure what was going on with their targets. They’d relented to Davie’s constant whining about wanting some scran and after winding him up for an hour -they had time to kill- they’d allowed him to go to Wigtown to replenish supplies at the Co-op. He’d turned up over an hour later with a couple of big bags of Doritos and a selection of pre-packaged sandwiches he said he’d finished up getting from the Shell garage in Newton. He’d needed to have a cheeseburger fresh from the microwave he said. He was a lot like a pregnant woman really, constant cravings, an excess of hormones and a not insubstantial belly. Rumour had it he had been tested for hermaphroditism on account of the size of his man boobs. Andy knew it was a rumour as he’d been in the pub when Colin started it.

Davie seemed a little more contented having scoffed the cheeseburger, or the two cheeseburgers it had turned out to be, so much so that after downing a litre of Powerade, seemingly oblivious of the fact it was supposed to be a sports drink, he fell asleep. Colin ensured this didn’t become too deep a slumber by throwing clods of frozen earth at his beloved car. The big man responded by bombarding the airwaves with expletive ridden transmissions questioning his brother’s parentage.

They couldn’t stay still for long. Despite their being well wrapped up the cold was bitter, made all the worse by the damp in the air. It was oppressive and all encompassing. This strip of land had once been waterlogged. It doubtless soon would be again and the mists clung to it at the best of times. They moved back and forth between the car and the airstrip. Emboldened by the peace so far, they walked at full height, hardly bothering to keep quiet.

Davie’s music got louder and he decided to demonstrate the perfect handbrake turn to Colin, regardless of the fact there was a layer of frost on the ground. He flicked on the not strictly road legal blue neon strip lights under the car, lighting up the tarmac underneath with an eerie glow. After some showboating and a few serious claims regarding Colin’s assertion that his younger brother’s ego was writing cheques his Peugeot couldn’t cash, Davie was primed for action.

He began at one end of the track running along the side of the airstrip, revving the engine and preparing with a few minor wheel-spins. When he was ready, the music was turned up decisively and Kanye West blasted from the back of the car, competing for attention with the drilled exhaust pipe. He finally let the clutch out for the last time, and starting with a triumphant wheel-spin that must have extended several metres and taken several thousand miles off his tyres, he made his approach.

From Andy’s vantage point, out on the far side of the airfield, he watched as the light show took shape. The blue lights under the car and the matching bulbs he’d seen fit to install in the headlamps lit up the woods to the other side. As the car tore along the side of the fence the light spread out across the strip, distorting, flickering and moving as Davie crossed each fence post, making the whole thing look as though it was happening on black and white cine-film, even if it was anything but silent.

He came to the end of his run up, swerved to the right ready for the handbrake and understeered, continuing in a straight line on the ice as the front wheels failed to respond to their orders. Without warning they bit properly and the car lurched forcefully in the desired direction but he’d overdone it. Andy’s heart jumped into his mouth and all he could do was stare. The car spun once, throwing light around the whole area, and then again and again. Each time it looked as though it should surely slow as the foreshortening took effect but each time it continued headed towards an inevitable sickening crunch. It never happened. The car finally came to a halt as all three breathed a sigh of intense relief.

The words “Am OK,” broadcast over the CB band confirmed all was well. He didn’t seem to have any witticisms for once.

Andy shook his head and wandered off down the strip towards the entrance to the complex, feeling a surge in confidence brought about by the idiot’s lucky escape and resolving to bite the bullet.

He moved slowly but purposefully, leaving the Chuckle Brothers to dissect the events of the past few seconds and pushing himself to get to the entrance before common sense kicked in and he thought better of it. He made it to the south side of the strip, passing the old wind sock which hung limply, bogged down by the weight of ice crystals and began to hear an engine. He marched faster now, all thoughts of common sense banished from his mind, all thoughts of anything other than getting a sneak peek at what was inside and where they were going.

He reached the corner of the new wall and the large gate he’d been unlucky at earlier in the week and began what his father would call skulking. He saw the lights coming as they reflected on the other side of the road and dived for the protection of the fence.

“Incoming,” he rasped into the radio.

“Eh?” came the response.

“They’re on their way.”

“Shit. I’m on it,” Davie replied, as the lights from his car died down and he could be heard wheel-spinning on to the road again, clearly subscribing to the theory of brute force and ignorance in respect to off-road driving, or at least getting back on to the road.

“Hold on, I’m coming,” Colin shouted, as the Peugeot fell quiet again, waiting now in whatever equivalent Davie had of stealth mode.

“Move it lady-boy,” was Davie’s response as Andy held his breath and waited.

The lights from the complex grew brighter until he was almost blinded by a mirror some conscientious health and safety type had seen fit to install on the other side of the road. He could make out the vehicle and the silhouette of someone climbing into the passenger side. The car accelerated towards the mirror before passing him as it rounded the corner and roared off. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected but this wasn’t it; a black possibly dark blue people carrier headed down the road towards the side track where Colin and Davie waited. A new people carrier just seemed all wrong somehow. They didn’t pay that much in these places did they? Maybe it was the boss’s. In any case, it wasn’t quite as strange as what he now saw before him. Clearly they weren’t planning on going anywhere soon. They’d left the gate open and the place lit up like Christmas.

“Something’s up,” he radioed the other two.

“The chickens have flown the coop,” Colin radioed back.

“I’m serious.”

“Hang on,” came the reply, as Andy saw the lights of the people carrier turn down the track they were on and slowly pass the Peugeot.

“Shit,” Colin blurted into his handset. “There must be four of them in there and they’re fucking massive.”

The people carrier came to a halt and everything went quiet for a few seconds.

“OK man, were gonna have to run but we’ll be back in five,” Colin said as he heard the Peugeot rev up and drive away at speed.

They’d bottled it. Andy felt a little let down, not to mention a little cold at the prospect of hanging around here for much longer.

In the rounded mirror on the other side of the road he could just see through the gate. Light seemed to be coming from what looked like an industrial porta-cabin in the middle of the nearest of the open sheds. He was curious now. He decided a trip across to the ditch on the other side might be a good call; better vantage point, better cover and a better chance to see who came back in. They would be back soon surely, must have got annoyed with the nutters driving up and down the track bordering the company property and decided to go for a bit of friendly intimidation. It seemed a bit full on though.

Curiosity got the better of him. Fuck it, you’re only young once, he thought and ran across the road, slipping on the ice and landing heavily with a sickening thud on his elbow. He rolled into the ditch.

That had hurt. In his experience it always hurt more when you’d been over-confident five seconds before. He tried to inspect the wound. He could feel the trickle of blood inside his sleeve but he quickly decided against looking at it with the light on his phone when he heard the diesel engine of the people carrier returning. He couldn’t see the headlights due to the amount of light pollution inside the complex which was now spread out in front of him. It was indeed a large porta-cabin in the shed near the gate. No expense spared.

He felt his elbow throb. The blood ran down as far as his wrist as he yanked up his sleeve but there was no time to think about that now. He really had the urge to find out what was inside. He would just go for it. Why not? He could shin over the wall afterwards. It hadn’t been the plan, wasn’t the real point to them being here but it might be a laugh. After all, there was no law of trespass in Scotland, was there? He was considering this some more when he noticed the cameras and remembered Colin’s warning, just as the people carrier rumbled round the corner on its way back, just before it came to a halt and the door slid open and just before he was asked if he wouldn’t mind stepping inside.

What could you do? It seemed rude to say no to a man with a Kalashnikov.