Blind Eye

by Stuart MacBride

  Logan stood in front of the machine on the third floor, trying to decide if he felt like a coffee, a tea, or a chicken noodle soup. Not that it mattered, they all tasted the same. He punched the buttons and reconstituted brown slurry gurgled into a thin plastic cup.

  He picked it up by the rim, trying not to burn his fingers, then wandered upstairs to the CID office. Rennie was there, boring PC Karim with his ‘how I caught the Sperminator story’.

  ‘… and I’m piecing together, like, a million hours of CCTV footage, trying to track the guy back from the shopping centre and all the way down Union Street…’

  Logan’s desk was a disaster area of forms and files. Again. Half of them weren’t even his. He stuck his cup of plastic coffee on top of a memo from DI Beattie, and gathered up an armful of witness statements. Then dumped them on the next desk over.

  He sat in his creaky swivel chair and stared at the dead computer. Thinking about booting it up and writing his letter of resignation.

  Dear Bastards,

  I quit.

  Screw you all.

  Detective Sergeant Logan McRae

  Karim kept glancing at his watch and shuffling towards the exit, but Rennie wouldn’t stop droning on, and on, and on. ‘Worked in a shoe shop…’ Blah, blah. ‘Confessed right away…’ Blah, blah. ‘Wife waited till he was handcuffed, then kneed him in the balls…’

  ‘Yeah, great,’ said Karim, when he could finally get a word in. ‘Got to go: post mortem in ten minutes.’

  ‘Ooh,’ Rennie grabbed his notebook. ‘Someone dead?’

  ‘Dirty Bob. They found him yesterday evening in the St Nicholas graveyard, round the back near the shopping centre?’ Karim sighed. ‘He was pretty broken up about his mate Richard dying… Doc Fraser says sometimes they’re like married couples: first one goes, then the other. I suppose it’s kind of sweet. Poor sod probably drank himself to death – stank of white spirit.’

  Logan’s stomach curdled. ‘White spirit?’

  ‘His tipple of choice.’

  And Logan had given him twenty pounds to go buy booze with. Great, something else for him to feel guilty about. He didn’t listen as Karim said his goodbyes and left the office.

  Rennie waited for the door to close before rummaging through his desk drawers, then scooted his chair across the CID office floor, until he was sitting next to Logan. ‘Got something for you.’ He handed over a carrier bag.

  There was something heavy in it, a rectangular box – about a foot long and three inches on either side – wrapped in brown paper. Instantly recognizable to every Scotsman over the age of twelve.

  The constable nodded. ‘Came for you yesterday – didn’t want to leave it lying on your desk, you know what a thieving bunch of bastards they are in here.’

  Logan tore the paper off, levered opened the cardboard box’s top flap, and pulled out the bottle of whisky inside. Thirty-year-old Knockdhu. There was a hand-written note Sellotaped to the bottle:

  ‘DEAR DS MCRAE,

  THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR SORTING OUT THAT WEE MIS UNDERSTANDING WITH COLIN MCLEOD AND HARRY JORDAN. WE ALL APPRECIATE IT.

  BEST WISHES,

  H.M.’

  ‘H.M.’ Hamish Mowat. Brilliant. That was just what Logan needed. A gift from Aberdeen’s top crime lord, thanking him for getting Creepy Colin off with attempted murder. Professional Standards were going to love that.

  Rennie took one look at the bottle and said, ‘Cool! Not your birthday is it?’

  Logan slid the bottle back into its box, then locked it in his bottom desk drawer. It could stay there until he figured out what he was going to do with it. ‘Don’t you have work to be getting on with? People to impress, arses to kiss?’

  ‘Jesus, you’re a happy little pixie since you got back from Poland, you know that?’ He stuck his feet flat on the floor and pushed, squeaking his chair back to his own desk. ‘Anyway, thought you were in with the rubber-heelers this morning.’

  ‘Steel went first: privilege of rank. I get to wait for my bollocking.’

  ‘Oh…’

  ‘Now sod off and leave me alone.’

  Logan poked away at paperwork for a while, but couldn’t work up any enthusiasm. What was the point? They were probably going to suspend him anyway. So he gave up and borrowed an Aberdeen Examiner from the media office, flipping through to the Jobs pages at the back.

  Everyone wanted years of experience. No one wanted a failed ex-Detective Sergeant with a crappy track-record and talent for disaster.

  He checked his watch. Steel had been in with Superintendent Napier for nearly three hours.

  Logan let his head sink forward until it was resting on a pile of uncompleted burglary reports. Sod this. He wasn’t just going to sit here and wait for Napier to summon him.

  He went to the IB lab instead, hoping to grab a couple of minutes with Samantha, but she was off at a crime scene in Blackburn.

  What now? Back to the CID office to sulk some more? Scrounge a cup of tea and some cake from the CCTV room? Or just walk out and never come back. Or he could do what he should have done last night: march into DCS Bain’s office and tell him who really tipped off Kravchenko about the Buckie Ballad. Slam the Polish bastard’s mobile on Bain’s desk and tell him where he could stick it…

  Logan dug the phone out of his pocket and stared at. How could he be so stupid? He turned the thing on – Kravchenko called last night, his number would be in the call history. They could run a GSM trace, turn Kravchenko’s handset into a homing beacon.

  He worked his way through the phone’s menus until he got to the right bit. ‘Sodding hell…’

  It was listed as ‘UNKNOWN’. Now he’d have to get a warrant to force the phone company to ignore the Data Protection Act and give him the details of who called. It would take days – maybe weeks – and there was no way Kravchenko’s ‘copper who bends’ wouldn’t find out about it.

  Back to plan A. He stomped up the stairs to Bain’s office, but the head of CID wasn’t there, he was having a shouting match with Finnie in the middle of the corridor.

  Logan took one look at them and froze.

  Finnie: ‘I should have been informed—’

  Bain: ‘It was on a strict need to know basis, and you—’

  Finnie: ‘I am a senior officer in this—’

  Bain: ‘Then try acting like one! I do not expect this kind of behaviour from—’

  Finnie: ‘Oh no, I bet you don’t. God forbid anyone should stand up to the Almighty Head Of CID!’

  Someone tapped Logan on the shoulder and he flinched. It was DS Pirie, curly ginger hair glowing in a shaft of sunlight. ‘I’d stay out of his way this morning, if I was you. Soon as he heard about Operation Creel he went ballistic.’

  Bain: ‘You’re on thin ice Chief Inspector!’

  Finnie: ‘Oh don’t give me that, you know I’m right. This whole disaster was mismanaged from the start.’

  There was no way Logan was wading into the middle of that. ‘I’ll come back later.’

  ‘Ah, it’ll blow over. It usually does. Just keep a low profile. And it just so happens I’ve got something that might get us both back in his good books.’ Pirie paused. ‘Interested?’

  Tempting. ‘I’m supposed to wait for a summons from Professional Standards.’

  The DS slapped Logan on the back. ‘Yeah, I heard. But think how much easier it would go if you had a success under your belt? I got a phone call from a Chiz I use, says he’s got a lead on the guys behind that boatload of guns.’

  ‘Did you get an address?’

  ‘I was going to tell the guvnor, but he’s mid-rant … If you want to tag along instead?’

  Damn right he did.

  All the pool cars were out, so they took Logan’s knackered Fiat. Sometime during the night the seagulls had paid a visit, and now the bonnet and roof were polka-dotted with acrid splatters of white and grey.

  Pirie held onto the seatbelt strap
as Logan ground his way through the gears. ‘Tell me you didn’t give someone money for this piece of shite.’

  ‘Very funny.’ Logan gave the gearstick one last yank and took them around the roundabout onto Wellington Road, the dirty bulk of Craiginches Prison crawling past on their left as he did his best to accelerate up the hill. ‘About Finnie—’

  ‘I told you: it’ll blow over. You just gotta give it time.’

  ‘No. I mean him and Wee Hamish Mowat.’

  Pirie’s left eyebrow shot up so fast it looked as if it was about to break free of his head. ‘Oh aye?’

  ‘I saw Finnie take a brown envelope from one of Wee Hamish’s boys.’

  ‘Ah…’ Pirie ran a hand through his wire-wool hair, watching as a scooter overtook them. ‘I can get out and push if you like?’

  ‘I’m serious.’

  ‘Finnie gets brown envelopes from Wee Hamish all the time.’

  ‘What?’ Logan stared at him. ‘You knew about it?’

  Shrug. ‘Course I did. Power behind the throne, remember?’

  ‘But… Why…?’

  ‘Why didn’t I report it? Because they don’t have money in them, they’ve got information. Look at it from Wee Hamish’s point of view: someone tries muscling in on his turf, what’s he going to do? Yeah, he can fight back, or whatever, but that costs him time, money, manpower, and there’s always the risk something will get connected to him. Never been arrested in his life, think he wants to start now?’

  Logan slumped, said, ‘Fuck,’ then banged his head off the steering wheel.

  Pirie’s voice jumped up an octave. ‘Think you’d like to keep your eyes on the road? Please?’

  ‘He’s using us.’

  ‘Where did you learn to bloody drive?’

  ‘He doesn’t need bent coppers, he gets us to do his dirty work for free.’

  ‘It’s a two-way thing, OK? Wee Hamish sends Finnie a wee brown envelope with all the details. We make the arrest – bad guys are off the streets, and no one gets fed to the pigs. It’s win, win…’ Pirie frowned. ‘Wait a minute, it was you, wasn’t it? You set Professional Standards on him: told them about the brown envelopes.’

  ‘I thought he was on the take.’

  ‘Do you have any idea how much pain and extra work you caused him? They crawled all over every inch of his record, picked him apart for two whole days. Made his life a living hell.’

  Logan sighed. ‘I’m sorry, OK?’

  Pirie threw his head back and laughed. ‘Sorry my arse – it’s been great. I owe you a drink!’

  66

  Peterseat Drive was a loop of dirty tarmac on the northernmost edge of Altens. Most of the buildings were new or not even finished yet: warehouses and storage depots. Stacks of offshore containers were locked away behind chain-link fences. Piles of drilling pipe. Huge chunks of metal, painted bright primary colours.

  Logan pulled the rattling Fiat up to the kerb and killed the engine, before it died of its own accord.

  ‘Right.’ Pirie unfastened his seatbelt and popped the passenger door open. ‘Got to have a quick word with my Chiz: find out what he knows.’

  Logan clambered out of the car, but Pirie held up a hand. ‘You know the rules – total anonymity for all Covert Human Intelligence Sources; my guy sees you, he’ll run a mile. Hell, I shouldn’t even be talking to this guy without Bain’s say so.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I’ll only be two minutes, OK? Just chill till then.’ Pirie turned, stuck his hands in his pockets and ambled across the road to a yard full of anchor chains.

  Logan slumped against the roof of the car and smoked a cigarette. He was grinding it out on the rusty paintwork when his mobile started ringing. He dug the phone out and grimaced: according the display it was DI Steel. Probably wanting to know where the hell he was. He let it ring through to voice-mail. She was back on thirty seconds later. Logan ignored it.

  Down the street, Pirie stuck his head out of a gate and beckoned.

  Logan hurried across the road. ‘Well?’

  ‘Sort of.’ Pirie turned and pointed at one of the brand-new warehouses. It wasn’t quite finished yet, the construction sign still up by the wire gates read: ‘COMING SOON – RIGSPANTECH DOWNHOLE SERVICES’. Dark blue roof and beige walls, attached to a small office block that hadn’t progressed beyond the raw breeze block and hollow window frames stage. No sign of life. ‘According to my guy, there was a firm called Kostchey International Holdings Limited doing site security there till about a week ago. You wanna check it out, see if we can get a billing address?’

  Logan did.

  They abandoned the Fiat where it was and walked down the half-finished pavement in the blazing sunshine. This part of the road was quiet, just the occasional clang of metal on metal, or beep-beep-beep of a reversing forklift truck. A radio somewhere inside one of the yards, playing Northsound 2.

  Pirie kicked an empty plastic bottle, sending it spinning down the dusty pavement. ‘So … did you really get blown up?’

  ‘That why you’re helping me get back into Finnie’s good books? Pity?’ The further down the road they walked the newer the buildings got, until they were just partially constructed shells.

  ‘Nope.’ They’d caught up with the plastic bottle, and Pirie gave it another kick.

  Logan’s phone started ringing. Again.

  ‘You going to answer that?’

  ‘It’ll be Steel, telling me I’m supposed to be in with Professional Standards.’

  The ringing stopped, there was silence, and then it started again.

  ‘It’s kinda irritating.’

  Logan pulled the thing out and switched it off. ‘Happy now?’

  One more kick and the bottle clattered against the fence surrounding RigSpanTech’s almost-finished warehouse. A length of chain was looped through both sides of the gate, but the padlock wasn’t shut.

  Logan followed Pirie into the building site. They hadn’t even started laying the road yet – everything was hard-packed dirt and rubble.

  Pirie shaded his eyes against the sun, staring at the half-built office unit and the warehouse beyond. ‘Look, over there – black BMW. Least we know someone’s about.’ He took two steps towards it, then stopped. Logan’s pocket was making ringing noises again. ‘Thought you switched that off?’

  ‘I did…’ And then Logan realized it wasn’t his phone, it was the one Kravchenko had given him. He fumbled it out and checked the display: ‘NUMBER WITHHELD’ His innards clenched. ‘I have to take this.’

  Pirie shrugged. ‘Catch up when you’re done then.’ He wandered away, whistling Scotland the Brave, and leaving a cloud of pale yellow dust in his wake.

  Logan punched the green button. ‘Hello?’

  67

  ‘Aye, I thought as much.’ It wasn’t Kravchenko, it was Steel. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing, screening out my calls? Where are you?’

  ‘Altens.’

  ‘Altens? You’re supposed to be getting bent over a desk by that knob-end Napier, no’ swanning about in sodding Altens.’

  ‘Got a lead on Kostchey International Holdings, I’m checking it out with Pirie.’ He started walking again. The black BMW was parked at the far side of the unfinished office unit, beside a couple of pallets of breeze blocks and some pantiles. No sign of the driver.

  No sign of Pirie either.

  ‘They suspend you?’

  ‘Are you kidding, I’m like the queen of sodding Teflon Town – nothing sticks to Detective Inspector Roberta Steel. But the bastards made me call the Warsaw police and tell them your mate Wiktorja was missing.’

  Logan peered in through one of the office windows, or at least the hole where one would be fitted. Nothing but bags of cement and a mixer. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘She doesn’t work there anymore.’

  The doorway was a big open space, so he tried inside, his shoes scuffing on the gritty concrete floor. It was just a c
ollection of empty rooms. ‘I know.’

  A flight of pre-cast stairs led up to the first floor. Logan climbed them and found more unfinished rooms: bare breeze block walls, gaping doorways, carefully piled boxes of building materials.

  Where the hell was Pirie?

  ‘What do you mean, you know?’

  ‘She told me.’

  A noise echoed up from downstairs.

  ‘She told you?’

  Logan peered down the hole where the stairs were, opened his mouth to shout hello, then swore very, very quietly. The person walking past on the ground floor – heading for the front of the office unit – was built like a rugby player, with angular features and hair that was receding at the front but a full-on mullet at the back. Kravchenko’s henchman, Grigor.

  Son of a rancid bitch.

  It looked as if Pirie’s informant was right; only Kostchey International Holdings Limited hadn’t cleared out a week ago, they were still here.

  ‘What do you mean she told you?’

  Logan crept back out of sight of the stairwell. Straining his ears to follow Mr Mullet’s progress on the floor below. It sounded as if he was heading for the front door.

  ‘Hello?’

  Logan whispered as loud as he dared, ‘They’re here!’

  ‘They’re…? What? Have you been drinking again?’

  ‘I’ve just seen Kravchenko’s thug go past downstairs.’

  Logan followed him, one floor up, risking a peek out of the empty window frame at the end of the corridor. Grigor was standing just outside the building, a mobile phone clamped to his ear, talking in rapid Polish.

  He was huge, and probably armed as well.

  Bloody hell. Where was Pirie when you needed him? And then Logan got the nasty feeling he knew exactly where Pirie was – lying battered in a corner somewhere, both hands tied behind his back, waiting for a visit from Kravchenko and his Swiss Army knife.

  Logan sneaked another peek over the window ledge. ‘I think Pirie might be hurt.’

  ‘That’s all I need. Where is he?’

  Outside, Grigor was facing away from the building, still on his mobile, staring out towards the chain-link fence.