Natural Causes

by James Oswald

  Dram in hand, McLean settled down into one of the high-backed leather armchairs beside the empty fireplace. The library was warm; those long windows trapped all the afternoon and evening sun. This room had always been his favourite. It was a sanctuary, a haven of peace and quiet where he could escape from the madness of the city outside. Head tilted against the soft leather back of the chair, McLean closed his eyes and let the weariness wash over him.

  *

  He woke to total darkness. For a moment he didn't know where he was, but then memory seeped back. McLean was about to reach for the lamp sitting on the table with the letters and his unfinished whisky when he realised what had woken him. There had been a noise, just the slightest of creaks in the floorboards, but he was certain it had been there. Someone else was in the house.

  He sat motionless, straining his ears to hear, trying to ignore the loud thumping of his own heart. Had he imagined it? The house was old, and full of creaking boards that shifted and groaned as the temperature changed. But he was used to those noises; he'd grown up with them. This was different. He let out his breath then held it, feeling the house around him. Had he shut the back door properly? It was a latch, he knew, but what if it hadn't clicked closed?

  Something metallic clinked against china. Out in the hallway there were two large ornamental vases. McLean could almost picture a stealthy intruder brushing one with a ringed hand. Now he had a focus for the sound, he could hear more: quiet breathing; the swish of loose-fitting clothes; the gentle touch of a hard object being put down very carefully on a wooden surface. The noises were purposeful, quiet by habit rather than design. Whoever was in the hall expected the house to be empty. He looked at the door, peering around the edge of the high-winged chair. No chink of light came from underneath, so the person on the other side either felt by touch, or was using some kind of night vision device. He reckoned on the latter, and that gave him a plan.

  There was scant light in the library. Its dark, book-lined walls didn't reflect much of the dull glow that filtered in from the city outside. But there was enough for him to make out the large furniture. He also knew where the loose floorboards were, clustered around the doorway and the fireplace. McLean took a moment to slip off his shoes, then trod as quietly as he could around the outside of the room until he reached the door. Outside he could hear more noises as the intruder moved methodically around the hall. He waited patiently, holding himself still, breaths shallow and regular.

  It seemed to take forever for the intruder to work his way around to the library, but finally McLean saw the brass handle begin to twist. He waited until the door was half open. A head, half obscured by heavy goggles peered through the gap. With a silent flick, McLean switched on the lights.

  'Argh! Bastard!'

  The figure was closer than McLean had expected, hands reaching up to a heavy headpiece, trying to tear it off before the night-vision apparatus burned out his retinas. Not waiting to let the burglar get his bearings, McLean reached forward and grabbed him by the front of his t-shirt, pulled hard as he stuck a foot out. They both fell to the floor, McLean ending up on top, wrestling to try and get the burglar into an arm lock.

  'Police. You're under arrest.'

  It never worked, but the lawyers insisted. For his pains, McLean got an elbow to the gut, driving the wind out of him. The burglar kicked out, arched his back, still struggling with one hand to tear off the night-vision goggles. He was strong, wiry under tight black T-shirt and jeans, and very reluctant to come quietly. McLean got a hand around his neck, a knee in his back, just like they taught you in Police College. It didn't do him much good as the burglar writhed like a bagful of eels. He slid around until he was facing McLean like a lover, drawing up his knees in a manner that was surely anatomically impossible.

  'Oof!' Feet drove the wind out of McLean's lungs as he pushed away. He crashed into one of the chairs, rolled off it and scrambled to his feet as the intruder made a leap for the doorway.

  'Oh no you don't.' McLean lunged forward, catching the man in a perfect rugby tackle. Their combined momentum carried them both forward too fast and with a horrible cracking sound, the burglar's head connected with the edge of the open door. He dropped like someone had switched him off, and McLean, unable to stop himself, landed heavily on top, getting a face full of burglar's buttock.

  He scrambled up, spluttering and coughing, grabbed the intruder's arms and twisted them behind his back. 'You are fucking nicked,' he said between gasps for breath, but it was academic. The man was out cold, his expensive night-vision goggles smashed to one side of his head and a large bruise flowering across his face.

  ~~~~

  26

  Tuesday morning and interview room three was stuffy and airless. It had no window, just a vent in the ceiling that was meant to pump fresh air but didn't. A plain white-topped table sat squarely in the middle, a few cigarette burns marking the formica. On the far side of it from the narrow door, a plastic chair had been bolted to the floor just too far away for its occupant to lean his elbows comfortably. He had tried, several times, and now slumped back, his cuffed hands in his lap.

  McLean watched him for a while, not saying a thing. So far the burglar had refused to give his name, which was a nuisance. He was a young man, late twenties to early thirties at a guess. Fit, too. McLean had a nice bruise on his right side where he'd wrestled him to the ground, but it was nothing compared to the mess that was the other guy's face.

  The door banged open and Grumpy Bob pushed in. He carried a tray with two mugs of tea and a plate of biscuits on it. Setting the whole lot down on the table, he handed one mug to McLean and took the other for himself, dunking a rich tea biscuit in the hot milky liquid.

  'What about me? Do I no' get anythin'?' The young burglar's accent was broad Glaswegian, making him seem like some Ned from the schemes. But McLean wasn't fooled. Anyone with the skill to pick a lock and the nous to use night-vision goggles was a cut above your average drug-addict burglar.

  'Let me see.' He pretended to think for a while, sipping from his own mug of tea. 'No. You don't. Here's how it works. You co-operate, we'll be nice.'

  'How about a ciggy then? I'm gasping here.'

  McLean pointed to the No Smoking sign fixed to the wall. The effect was slightly marred by the heavy biro marks erasing the word 'No.'

  'One of the few good things to come out of Holyrood, that. You can't smoke anywhere in this building. Not even the cells. And you're going to be spending a long time in the cells if you don't co-operate.'

  'You can't keep me locked up in here. I know my rights. I want to see a lawyer.'

  'Got that off the telly did you?' Grumpy Bob asked. 'Think you know all about the polis because you watch The Bill? You don't get a lawyer until we say so, sunshine. And the longer you piss us about, the longer that'll be.' He took another biscuit from the plate and bit into it, sending a shower of crumbs to the floor.

  'OK. Let's start with what we know.' McLean took off his jacket, hanging it on the back of his chair. He fished in one of the pockets, coming out with a pair of latex gloves which he slowly pulled on, snapping the rubber and smoothing the fingers. All the while the burglar watched him with wide, grey eyes.

  'You were found last night in the house of the late Mrs Esther McLean.' McLean bent down and lifted a cardboard box from the floor, dumping it on the table. He pulled out a heavy canvas duffle bag, wrapped in plastic. 'You were carrying this bag, and wearing these.' He took the night vision goggles from the box and placed them on the table. They too were encased in a clear plastic evidence bag.

  'Inside the bag, we found several items taken from the house.' He lifted out a set of silver ornaments that had been in a display cabinet in the hall. It felt odd to be handling his grandmother's possessions like this, even wrapped up. 'You were also carrying a set of lock-picking tools, a stethoscope, a high-speed electric drill and a set of clothes a man of your age might wear to a nightclub.' He laid the offending articles out on the table. 'O
h, and this set of keys, which I assume is to your house. There were BMW car keys on the ring as well, but my colleague Detective Constable MacBride has taken them to the nearest franchised garage to get the code checked against their owners database.'

  As if on cue, there was a knock on the door, it opened a fraction, and then Constable MacBride popped his head in. 'Something for you, sir,' he said, handing over a sheet of paper and another clear evidence bag. McLean looked at it and smiled.

  'Well, Mr McReadie, it seems we won't be needing your co-operation after all.' He stared at the burglar, looking for signs of discomfort and finding them writ large.

  'Take him back down to the cells, Bob. And tell the duty sergeant, no fags OK?' He picked up the evidence bag with the keys in it and shoved them in his pocket. 'Stuart, round up a couple of constables and meet me at the front. I'm going to see about getting a search warrant organised.'

  *

  For a Ned, Mr Fergus McReadie had done rather well for himself. His address was a large loft conversion apartment in an old warehouse down in Leith Docks. Twenty years earlier, it would have been the haunt of prostitutes and drug dealers, but with the Scottish Office relocation and HMS Britannia, Leith was upmarket these days. Judging by the cars parked in their allocated bays, the development wasn't cheap either.

  'How the other half live, eh sir?' Constable MacBride said as they took the lift to the loft floor five storeys up. It opened onto a spotless hallway with just two apartment doors leading off. McReadie's was the one on the left.

  'I don't know. Can't really call it a tenement if it doesn't smell of stale piss.' McLean pointed at the other door. 'See if the neighbours are home. With any luck they might know a bit about our cat burglar's other life.'

  As the constable buzzed on the right hand door, McLean let himself into McReadie's apartment. It was a vast hangar of a space, old wooden beams criss-crossing the ceiling. The loading doors had been converted into full height windows, overlooking the docks and out into the Firth of Forth. One corner of the room formed an open-plan kitchen, and at the far end, spiral steps lead up into the rafters and a sleeping platform. Underneath it, two doors suggested more partitioned space.

  'OK, people. We're looking for anything that might be stolen goods, any information about Mr McReadie we can find.' He stood in the middle of the room as Constable Kydd and Grumpy Bob started to rummage around, opening doors and looking under cushions. A huge plasma TV screen dominated one wall, and beneath it neatly arranged shelves of discs. McLean looked at some of the titles; they were mostly Japanese Manga and Kung-Fu films. Tacked on the end, almost as if they were an afterthought, were the complete set of Pink Panther movies. The boxes were battered and worn, as if they had been watched many times. Except the last one, which still had its cellophane wrapping around it.

  'Sir?'

  McLean looked around to see DC MacBride standing in the open doorway. A woman stood behind him, her long blonde hair tousled as if she had been asleep, her eyes wide as she watched the policemen search the flat. He hurried over.

  'This is Miss Adamson,' MacBride said. He looked slightly stunned. 'She lives next door.'

  On closer inspection, McLean could see that Miss Adamson was dressed only in a long silk dressing gown. Her feet were bare.

  'What's going on? Where's Fergus? Is he in trouble?' Her voice was thick with sleep.

  'Miss Adamson. Detective Inspector McLean.' He held up his warrant card for her to see, but she hardly seemed able to focus. 'I'm sorry to disturb you, but I wonder if you could answer a few questions for us.'

  'Sure. I s'pose. I'm not in trouble, am I?'

  'Not at all, miss. No. I'm interested in what you know about your neighbour, Fergus McReadie.'

  ''kay. Come over and I'll put some coffee on.'

  Miss Adamson's apartment was smaller than McReadie's but still large enough. She stepped lightly round a stainless steel counter that separated her kitchen from the bulk of the living space, busying herself with beans and grinder. Soon the air filled with a powerful aroma.

  'So what's Fergus done then, inspector? I always thought there was something slightly creepy about him.'

  McLean settled himself on one of the tall stools that were arranged along its length. Behind him he could sense Constable MacBride's unease.

  'I can't exactly say, not until he's been charged. But we caught him red-handed, Miss Adamson.'

  'Vanessa, please. Only my agent calls me Miss Adamson.'

  'Vanessa, then. Tell me. Have you known Fergus McReadie long?'

  'He was there when I moved in about, what, two years ago? I'd see him in the elevator, we'd say hello. You know how it is.' She plunged the coffee then poured it into three mugs, turning to pull a large carton of fat-free milk from the enormous fridge behind her. McLean couldn't help noticing that, apart from a couple of bottles of champagne, it was pretty much empty. 'He tried to hit on me a couple of times. But he wasn't my type. Too geeky, and that accent just used to get on my nerves.' Her own voice was soft, with the faintest trace of American mixed in with the Edinburgh.

  'Do you know what he does for a living, then?' McLean accepted the proffered drink, unsure quite why MacBride was so reluctant to come forward and claim his.

  'He's some sort of computer security expert, I think. He tried to explain it to me once. My mistake for inviting him to the party, I guess. He made it sound glamorous, like he spent his life trying to break into banks and stuff. You know, so he could show them where their weaknesses were? I got the impression most of it involved sitting in front of a computer watching numbers scroll past.'

  There was a light tapping at the door. McLean looked round to see Constable Kydd framed in the doorway. Her gaze shifted from him to Vanessa and her eyebrows shot up. He looked back at his hostess, wondering what he was missing.

  'Oh, do come in officer. There's plenty more coffee.' Miss Adamson stooped for another cup and McLean averted his eyes as the dressing gown parted to reveal perhaps more than was intended.

  'That's very kind ma'am,' the constable said, not moving from the doorway. 'But I think the inspector should come see what we've found.'

  'No rest for the wicked, eh?' McLean levered himself off the stool. 'Constable MacBride, stay here and get as much detail as you can about our burglar. Vanessa, thankyou for your help. I'll be back for the rest of that coffee if you don't mind.'

  'Not at all inspector. It's quite the most exciting thing that's happened to me all summer. And who knows when I might have to play the part of a policewoman. This is a wonderful opportunity for research.'

  As he turned to leave, McLean was almost certain he saw Constable Kydd mouth a silent, questioning 'Vanessa?' to MacBride, but her expression dropped back to its normal not-quite-angry self before he could be sure. He followed her out, across the hall and back into McReadie's apartment. One of the two doors at the far end stood open.

  'Am I missing something, constable?' McLean asked as they crossed the huge space.

  'You didn't recognise her, sir? Vanessa Adamson? Won a bafta last year for her role in that BBC period drama? Oscar nominated for that Johnny Depp movie?'

  He hadn't seen either, but he'd seen her on the news, now that he thought about it. McLean felt the tips of his ears heat up. No wonder she'd looked a bit familiar.

  'Really? I thought she was taller.' He took refuge from his embarrassment in the room through the open door, a large study, lit by a single floor to ceiling window. A wide, glass-topped desk supported a laptop computer and a phone, but nothing else. Grumpy Bob sat in the black leather executive chair, spinning it from side to side.

  'Found something, Bob?'

  'I think you'll like this, sir.' He stood up and reached for a book on the top shelf behind him. When he pulled it out, the whole shelving unit clicked, moved forward and slid sideways on silent runners. Behind it, there was another set of shelves, glass this time and lit from above and below. They were stacked with a bewildering collection of jewellery.
<
br />   'How on earth did you find that, Bob?' McLean walked around the desk, peering into the hoard.

  'I was looking at the titles, sir. Saw one that McReadie'd written himself. Thought I'd have a look at it, see if there was a biography in it. Only he hadn't written it, had he. It was his little joke.'

  'Well, ten out of ten for observation. Eleven out of ten for jammy luck.'

  'It gets better, sir. I found these too.' Bob reached down and pulled a couple of newspapers out of the bin beneath the desk. The Scotsman from the previous week. He unfolded them both and spread them out. One had been left open at the announcements page, the other at the obituaries. Both had circles of black biro on them. McLean recognised the grainy black and white photograph of his grandmother, taken forty years earlier. Grumpy Bob beamed the smile that had earned him his nickname so many years before.

  'I think this just might be our obituary man, sir.'

  ~~~~

  27

  'McLean! Where the fuck were you yesterday morning? Why weren't you answering your phone?'

  Chief Inspector Duguid marched down the corridor towards him, face livid red, hands clenched into ugly fists. McLean struggled for a moment to remember what he had been doing, so much had happened since. Then it all clicked back into place.

  'I had the day off, sir. I was burying my grandmother. If you'd spoken to Chief Superintendent McIntyre she'd doubtless have told you. She might also have let you know that I came in early anyway to finish up the report on your uncle's death and his killer's suicide.'

  Duguid's face went from livid red to ghostly white in an instant. His piggy little eyes widened and his nostrils flared like a bull pawing the ground ready to charge.

  'Don't you dare mention that in here, McLean.' Duguid's voiced hissed out through tight lips and he looked around nervously to see if anyone had heard. There were a number of uniforms going about their business, but they had enough of a sense of self-preservation to avoid eye contact with the chief inspector. If they had heard anything, they weren't showing it.