Cause of Death

by Peter Ritchie

  He threw his first spanner in the works. ‘I’ll answer anything I can to help with these terrible crimes. Go ahead, Chief Inspector – I’m all yours.’

  Macallan’s skin crawled. It was everything and nothing. He talked, admitted using prostitutes and refused nothing. He knew that like so many others he could not account for where he was at the time of the attacks in Edinburgh and Glasgow, though he admitted being in Glasgow on the day, acting for a client. He was open about his relationship with his wife and that she would not be able to say that he was in or out on a particular evening.

  Macallan didn’t mention the attacks in other cities beyond the one in Glasgow, keeping that in reserve until the researchers and analysts had done their job. She decided that the interview was going to end up a draw and thought perhaps they should try to dig up a bit more before speaking to Barclay again.

  She threw in the last set of questions. ‘Mr Barclay, I know you might not know any of these women by their proper names, but I can show you a photograph of one of the girls who survived an attack here in Edinburgh.’ She pushed a photograph of Pauline Johansson across the table. And for the second time in the interview something pulsed briefly across his expression before it was gone, but Harkins and Macallan had caught it, and his answer surprised them again – none of it was going to script.

  ‘I do know this girl and so the answer is yes, I’ve used her services but I can’t remember when that was. Probably weeks or months ago but I can’t think where.’

  Macallan realised they had moved into a place they had no plan for and what followed would have to be off the cuff. Barclay’s reaction to Johansson’s photograph had puzzled Macallan though. It was as if some awful truth had hit him between the eyes. What did it mean? She decided to ask two more questions. ‘I want to show you a photograph of the girl who was killed in Glasgow. It’s not been published as very little is known about her at the minute.’

  She pushed the photo across the table. ‘Do you know her?’

  Jonathon Barclay stared at the photograph then looked up at Macallan. Something had changed in his bearing. His shoulders had fallen, but he could dig deep, and he kept his composure. Macallan almost admired the way he was handling it all and realised she knew the answer to her question before he spoke. It was there in his eyes.

  ‘I know this is going to sound terrible, but yes, I know this girl as well. I should say though that it would be entirely possible for a man who uses the services of these girls to have been with both of them and not be the culprit.’

  Macallan knew that if they’d been in court, he would have been the first to sneer at that answer.

  ‘Again, I think it was weeks ago, and I picked her up off the street.’

  Macallan asked her last question: ‘Are you the man who attacked these women?’

  ‘No, and I don’t really want to say any more today.’

  Macallan sat back and looked Barclay straight in the eye, and he broke first, looking down into his hands. Macallan closed the interview then spoke to Harkins in another office. ‘I think we should cut it there for the moment. What do you think?’

  ‘Fine with me. I don’t know if I can come to terms with what’s been said. We could soon have enough to detain this guy. I’m sure I’m dreaming. Why the fuck is he admitting to knowing the girls?’ Harkins shook his head. ‘Anyway the only thing we need to do is ask if he’ll let us have a look at the car, and if he refuses there’s not much we can do at the moment, but I think JJ will want it grabbed ASAP.’ He shook his head again. ‘I just don’t get what I’m hearing.’

  Harkins looked like someone had stolen his wallet.

  ‘You okay, Mick? You look a bit frazzled. Thought you’d have been happy seeing old Beelzebub coming apart in there.’

  Harkins didn’t smile and didn’t try. ‘I just can’t get my head around it; this is not the way he plays it.’

  They walked back into the interview room and discovered Barclay had just about recovered any lost composure.

  ‘Okay, that’s all for now,’ Macallan told him. ‘You’ve been very helpful. Clearly we’ll want to see you again, and if there’s anything you want to ask then go ahead. Before I forget, is there any possibility we could have a look at your car? You know you can refuse but we always ask.’

  That was when the game changed direction for the third time in the space of the interview. ‘I’m sorry, and obviously your colleagues haven’t told you, but my car was stolen last night. It’s still not been found as far as I’m aware.’

  She couldn’t hold it back. ‘You have to be pulling my leg. That’s the oldest one in the book.’

  Barclay sat back in his seat; he’d known the effect this would have.

  ‘I know how it looks but I can assure you that the car was stolen. Do you think I’d have been stupid enough to use my own car anyway if I was the man you’re looking for? I’ve seen the publicity like everyone else.’

  Macallan took control. Barclay’s answers had made him their prime suspect, and they needed to get a plan of action put together before he could take care of any remaining evidence. Though she personally didn’t think he was the killer, there was no way they could ignore the line of investigation, and once Barclay had been escorted out, she rang O’Connor to arrange a meeting.

  Barclay walked to his taxi. The truth was beginning to crush him, and normally he would have known what to do next, but not this time. The car being stolen looked bad, and if he’d been an everyday lowlife they would have tossed him into a cell already.

  Pieces of his past floated through his imagination; like a new life forming, the sum of his parts would join and meld into something that frightened him.

  He opened his eyes and realised he was nearly home. He’d never cared about the house other than as a commodity that reinforced his image, but he wanted it to be home now. He felt like a soldier facing battle, suddenly discovering a god he’d never believed in, and he was afraid that there was no one in the world who could or would give their shoulder to him.

  The problem was that he didn’t know why he was afraid.

  48

  Macallan and Harkins sat in O’Connor’s office, and he listened without interruption until she finished her account.

  ‘What do you think?’ he asked her. ‘And I’m fine with gut feelings.’

  Macallan knew the dangers of being distracted by what seemed to be the natural line of investigation. So often in murder enquiries what seemed obvious turned out to be completely wrong. Coincidences happened, and innocent people got caught up in the hunt.

  ‘I think he has to be worth putting a team on full time, though it may all just be coincidence. He didn’t need to tell us a thing, and I wish I could understand why he admitted to knowing the girls, but then maybe it’s because he is the culprit and he knows we’ll get him eventually. Regardless, I think we need to move fast, because if it is him and there’s any evidence left, he’ll be getting rid of it – though it’s more likely it’s already a pile of ash. I’ve no doubt the car will be torched, but I’ve got a marker on the PNC when it’s found.’

  O’Connor looked out of the window and wished he was out in the field rather than sitting in his office. He’d never thought that way, and a picture dropped into his mind. He was with Macallan and somewhere a million miles from his office. He smiled and got down to business.

  ‘Great work. Get all this to the analysts, create full profiles of all the cases and I think once that’s done get an interview strategy drawn up as soon as. In the meantime, it seems to me that the only chance we have to secure evidence is getting DNA from clothing, presuming that the car’s a non-starter.’

  Macallan’s phone went off and interrupted them. It was a message that Pauline Johansson wanted to see her.

  49

  Macallan hadn’t seen Johansson for nearly a week and the improvement in her was remarkable. Time and again during the Troubles she’d witnessed miracles in the way people had survived the most appalling injuries. A
senior doctor had once told her that it was the will to live as much as medical intervention that made the difference in recovery. Johansson would be scarred for life but there was a spark in her eyes, and her colour looked more like that of a healthy young woman.

  Macallan smiled and it was genuine. Johansson returned the smile although it was lopsided, and despite the damage there was hope in her expression. For the first time in years she was off heroin, and her body was feeding on something other than the odd chocolate bar and can of oversweetened juice. It occurred to Macallan that maybe something half good might come out of all this carnage. If she hadn’t been attacked, she’d have been dead within another few years – and that was if she was lucky.

  ‘How are you, Pauline? Looking good and putting on weight I think – no bad thing.’

  Johansson squeezed her hand; there was strength there now – a recovery of sorts. Macallan decided at that moment that she would speak to Johansson’s parents, even plead with them if that’s what it took to get them back in her life.

  ‘Okay, let’s do some work. Have you remembered something? If you have, let’s use the blink system. Okay?

  One blink.

  Pauline Johansson had remembered something. As the days had passed and her strength had returned, she’d wrestled with the pieces of memory like they were from a freshly opened jigsaw box. Her problem was that a lot of the pieces were missing for ever. Some remained though, and would flick across her mind’s eye like a subliminal message.

  Eventually there was one that recurred and flashed without form, but she knew it meant something. She wanted the man who’d attacked her to suffer – to feel as frightened as she had been for too long, so she tried hard to pull it to the surface.

  She’d woken the previous morning and there it was, like a grainy old movie. The man had form but no face, just a vague demon tormenting her. But she’d remembered that, as she lay on the ground half-conscious, the demon had stopped beating her and removed her cardigan before beginning the torture anew.

  It took a full hour but Macallan eventually got the story and sat back, considering. The killer was collecting trophies. It wasn’t something that had been picked up as a pattern in the cases, but it could be crucial in putting him away – if they could find them. If it really was Barclay then he would have to be crazy to keep these things. It was one for the shrinks.

  She called the office and asked Young to look at the other cases and establish if there was any possibility of items being taken from the victims. She knew that the Glasgow victim hadn’t been wearing underwear, but it had been presumed this was more to do with getting her job done than anything else.

  She wrapped her arms around Johansson and promised to come back soon, then decided to visit Johansson’s parents, who’d moved to Portobello in an effort to escape their own story.

  Macallan told them all about the trial their daughter was enduring and how her old life was gone for ever. She told them that their daughter was someone who’d endured a deficit of love since the day she’d taken her first hit, that she deserved to be loved and that it was unlikely she would ever find that love from a man, given the efforts of her attacker.

  The parents had sat straight backed and unresponsive, but Mrs Johansson broke first and then the dam opened. Mr Johansson slumped at the sight of his broken wife and put his face into his hands.

  They’d been loving parents but had lived for years as if Johansson was dead – and in a way she had been. It had been a necessary pretence to save them from breaking apart themselves. In order to safeguard the memories they had of their daughter before her introduction to heroin, they had buried their love of her.

  Macallan sat quietly and let them release their years of pain. Mrs Johansson asked first when they could see her, and her husband simply nodded at the question before putting his arm around his wife.

  Macallan told them she’d call as soon as she’d spoken to their daughter then left the Johansson home, managing to wait till she was outside to let the tears fall. She promised herself that she would find the man who’d shattered Pauline Johansson’s body and that she would not forget that young woman.

  Life had robbed the Johanssons, and Macallan would do everything she could to help the family recover. Too often the system picked up shattered families, extracted the required information or compelled an appearance at court and then left them messed up for life. Macallan wouldn’t let it happen to this family – they’d suffered enough.

  50

  Young sat down at the table in O’Connor’s office with Harkins and Macallan. Although they’d already been told, Macallan ran over the information she’d gained from Johansson one more time, stressing what a breakthrough it could be for them. O’Connor knew exactly what it meant – that there was always the danger of a leak so they might have to act on this quicker than they would have preferred.

  When Macallan was done, Young announced that they’d finished their research into the lead.

  ‘We’ve looked at as many of the cases as possible. We have to presume that in the case of the Glasgow murder, her lack of underwear was due to it being taken rather than being an intentional act by the girl. Apart from that we can’t see anything missing in the other attacks. However, the early cases we think are connected to the current crimes were serious assaults rather than murders, and the women were heroin addicts with very poor recall. I believe that as there are no previous reports of missing clothing from the victims that he’s just started to take trophies. This might seem strange – not what we would normally expect – but there have been other cases where the pattern of behaviour changes or develops, and I think that’s what’s happening here. It’s as if all of this is part of a plan leading to a conclusion rather than it being random acts of violence. It’s calculated, not obsessive compulsive behaviour, and the profilers agree.’

  She stopped and waited for O’Connor to comment. He ran hypotheses through his head but there was no answer coming.

  ‘Anyone any ideas on what this means?’ he asked. ‘I really don’t know but I agree with Felicity that this is carefully planned and heading towards some sort of climax. If he’s just started taking items then it’s not a compulsion and he has a reason. He must know that there’s a risk in keeping them so why take them now when he’s had all the luck so far?’

  Macallan looked at O’Connor and saw the strain around his eyes. This case was all bad; they were dealing with something they simply didn’t understand. They weren’t even close.

  ‘If Felicity is right then this guy is something different, given what he’s done in the past. I’m beginning to think he’s playing a game with us and probably not concerned about being caught. In fact, I think that maybe he’s factored that in. Someone as intelligent as this one must know that he’ll make mistakes somewhere along the line.’

  O’Connor felt the tremors in his stomach and knew that he had to make a decision – and take some risks.

  ‘We have a number of problems to deal with. This man can and probably will strike again, and given that we have a suspect we’ll be hung out to dry if we don’t act and it turns out to be him. Nothing seems to be making sense in relation to how Barclay is acting – he’s definitely not playing to the script, although we probably shouldn’t expect predictable behaviour if he’s our culprit. There’s the risk that the killer is keeping the missing clothes, and if it leaks, which it will, then again we’ll be hung out for not acting against the prime suspect. Grace, I want you to get over to the fiscal’s office and apply for a warrant to search his house. I can’t believe he’d be stupid enough to keep these things there, but we can’t risk doing nothing, especially as the car is probably lying torched somewhere.’

  As they left the meeting the news came in from the uniforms that Barclay’s Mercedes had been found completely burned out on the outskirts of Glasgow. O’Connor laughed without any humour. ‘Well, he played that one dead centre.’

  Macallan took the news with a growing sense that although
they had a suspect, they were essentially in the middle of nowhere.

  She went straight to the procurator fiscal to explain what they had and was surprised at how easily he complied with the request for a warrant to search Barclay’s home. The fiscal had locked horns with Barclay in court on a number of occasions, and although he didn’t admit it, he tended to come off worst in their verbal battles. In fact, Barclay had humiliated him on one occasion and set the fiscal’s career back a few years. That one burned inside him still, and he could hardly contain his joy that Barclay might be about to fall. He encouraged Macallan to move with all due haste.

  ‘If there’s a chance of recovering evidence then we can’t afford to wait, Chief Inspector. Please keep me informed, and let me know when you decide to detain him.’

  The fiscal got hold of a friendly sheriff, and the warrant was put in Macallan’s hands.

  She called Harkins to get a team together for the search.

  ‘I want trained search teams to do this, not just whoever’s sitting around. I want every inch of that house searched and anything that he might have been wearing recently taken for examination.’

  Minutes after Macallan left the fiscal’s office, he picked up the phone and called Bell. ‘Hi, Jacquie. Got something that might tickle your fancy. Have you come across Grace Macallan from the MCT? She’s one of the lead officers on these prostitute attacks.’

  Bell smiled at how small the world was. ‘As a matter of fact I have. What’s up?’

  The fiscal told her the whole story and she scribbled as he talked. She regarded him as a severe pain in the arse but a very useful source of information, so fair game. He had the hots for her, so she strung him along in the name of keeping the public informed, and, more importantly, keeping her editor happy.

  ‘Thanks for that,’ she told him. ‘It’ll be my turn for the drinks. Need to run.’