Stay of Execution

68

Neil McIlhenney could have run the Mawhinney inquiry from his office at the Fettes building, but he had chosen to set up the murder room at the coastal-division headquarters in Queen Charlotte Street, to have immediate access to its manpower. He could also have excluded Mario McGuire from the investigation completely, but he had more sense than to try.

However, the superintendent knew that being seen to report to a junior officer only three days into his command would do nothing for his future authority, and so he had the sense in his turn to keep well clear. He was in his office when the door opened and McIlhenney came in.

‘I wanted to thank you,’ he said. ‘That was bloody good work, bringing that guy Hughie Geller in last night. His statement’s the only sniff of a lead we’ve got.’

‘Has word got out that I was involved in it?’

‘No. The statement’s countersigned by the duty sergeant who took it, and that’s all.’

‘That’s good. I told him I’d have his balls if my name was mentioned at all, or Malky Gladsmuir. That’s a spin-off benefit. Gladsmuir’s mine now, and I want to protect him.’

‘I thought he was Jay’s before.’

‘He had Jay in his fucking pocket: life’s changed for him.’ He looked up at his friend. ‘Where are we going with the Land Rover?’

‘We’ve got the biggest magnet we can find, but it’s still quite a task.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Needle in a haystack, but I’ve got George Grogan working on it. He’s been back to the witness and he’s showed him Land Rover vehicle types. The best he could do was narrow it down to either a Range Rover or a Discovery, but that helps a bit. Total annual production’s about a hundred thousand, and both models are big export sellers. We’ll get accurate figures from the DVLA but I reckon we’re looking at over fifty thousand new UK registrations every year. It’s a new-style registration so we’re going back three years maximum; that takes us up to a hundred and fifty thousand Range Rovers and Discos. We’re trying to find one out of that lot.’

‘You’ll start with local, though.’

‘Of course. That’s George’s priority.’

‘Good. It means we. . sorry, you’ll have something to show the Americans when they get here.’

‘Aye. And you never know; maybe they’ll have something to show me.’