Cold Grave

by Craig Robertson

  He knew the short cut to the side entrance from the Dowanhill side, the one Greg Deans had taken down from the car park on Crown Terrace wasn’t the kind of route that appealed on a dark night, particularly to women, as it wasn’t overlooked and was poorly lit.

  Winter parked up above the pub and followed Deans’ route to the steps. Blue and white tape had been tied across the top to stop anyone else venturing down but there was no sign of Murray or Boyle. Winter’s heart sank as he saw the number of footprints in the snow around the car park and at the area at the top of the steps. The only bonus was the crisp snow, which meant the prints that hadn’t been trodden over stood out nice and clear. He laid down a black photo scale and photographed the footprints as best he could, cursing the number that had been crushed down by another boot, leaving patterns that were all but useless.

  Photographing the prints from a regulation 90-degree angle, using a macro lens and with a 45-degree flash to avoid washing out the detail, he was still able to pick out a few good tracks. He’d photographed Deans’ shoes before leaving the hospital so he would be able to separate those from the others at the scene and it would hopefully give them something to work with. For all that though, he knew it was more in hope than expectation. Who knew how many people had walked over the area either before or after Deans was pushed.

  Winter made his way to the top of the steps, seeing just how steep and narrow they were, seemingly tumbling forever into the darkness below. The winter foliage pushed in from left and right, making the descent seem even sharper. He made his way down a couple of steps at a time, stopping only to photograph likely looking prints until he reached the first landing and spied a flattened area where it seemed likely Deans had fallen. The snow was compressed but not trampled and there were a few drops of blood to the right-hand side of the landing and then again a few steps further down. It looked as if Deans had hit the level area, then continued to tumble, probably out cold by that stage and unable to stop his momentum.

  The biggest pool of blood was at the bottom, just a few feet from the pub’s side door and the place where Deans had come to rest. Blood had soaked into the snow and become frozen there, capturing Winter’s attention the way blood always did. He photographed the blood spatter from every angle with his macro lens, marking out the contours of the snow compression to show where Deans had landed.

  So why had the attacker not finished Deans off? Maybe he’d thought the fall would have done the trick. You could see the reasoning in that: the guy’s head was going to bounce off successive sets of concrete steps. While the blow may been cushioned by a layer of snow, there was hard ice underneath. Also, Winter thought, Deans would have made the trip to the bottom a whole lot quicker than his assailant and there was every chance that the crash of the fall would have alerted someone and brought them out from the pub. Then again, maybe Rachel was right and the push had only been a warning to Deans. Either way, Winter knew there was little he was going to be able to offer forensically to the debate – too many pairs of feet had seen to that.

  He turned and looked back up the stairs to see where the attacker would have stood. It was doubtful if they could have seen from there whether Deans was alive or not. He had still been unconscious when he was discovered by customers and staff so presumably he hadn’t moved after he hit the bottom. There was every chance he’d simply been left for dead.

  The voice that came from behind him seemed, not for the first time, to read his thoughts.

  ‘You seeing dead people again?’

  ‘You shouldn’t creep up on people like that, Rach.’

  ‘Course I should,’ she laughed drily, glancing up and down the stairway before planting a kiss on his lips. ‘It’s my job. So what have you got?’

  ‘Not much,’ Winter admitted. ‘Half of Glasgow seems to have been walking over the area at the top of the stairs. The blood trail suggests he hit that first landing up there and kept rolling till he ended up right here. I’ve got pics of what I can but I doubt it will do us much good.’

  ‘Pretty much what we expected,’ Rachel agreed. ‘Still, I do have some good news.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’

  ‘Things are looking up at last. I’ve just had a call from Marty Croy in Stirling. The Procurator Fiscal has given them the go ahead to exhume Barbie’s body. We’re going to dig her up in two days.’

  CHAPTER 40

  Thursday 20 December. 10.00 a.m.

  ‘Dad? Dad, are you still there?’

  She hated the phone calls. Hated them for how impractical they were and how she couldn’t tell if he’d fallen asleep, switched his mobile off or forgotten how to work it. Above all, though, she hated the impersonal nature of it and the fact that it was so blindingly obvious she hadn’t taken the time to go and see him face to face.

  ‘Dad, just say something and let me know you can hear me.’

  She always resisted the urge to be impatient with him or to raise her voice. Whatever the reason for the lack of response, it wasn’t his fault. None of it was his fault. It was that horrible, hateful disease. She spent what little free time she now had reading up on it and none of it made her any more optimistic about what was to come.

  How did they treat a disease when they didn’t know how it was contracted in the first place? Nearly half a million people in the UK were affected by Alzheimer’s and yet no son or daughter or grandchild could be told for sure how they’d got it. A combination of factors was the best answer that could be offered: lifestyle; unknown environmental factors; and, most scarily, genetic inheritance. The greatest risk of all was growing old and she became irrationally angry at reading that. How the hell was her dad expected to avoid that?

  She now knew about ‘plaques’ and ‘tangles’ that developed in the structure of the brain, killing off brain cells and leading to the broken pathways and muddled thinking she’d seen manifested so clearly in her dad. She knew of all the medical treatments, both established and in testing. She knew there was no cure. She knew her father might have had the disease for years, with it developing silently all the while. She knew everything except what to do next.

  Above all, one word kept reappearing in everything that she read. A word that she had grown to despise: progressive.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi Dad. It’s Rachel.’

  The silence again. Was he trying to remember who she was? Was he upset at hearing her voice, even though he’d clearly forgotten speaking to her just a minute before? Or had he gone?

  She filled the interminable quiet with guilty thoughts of her absence and dark fears of how bad it might get and how quickly. Once this case was over, she kept telling herself, she would make things right. She would take him out of the home whether he liked it or not and get him to come live with her. It would mean moving and it might mean the end of her and Tony but what was more important than looking after her dad?

  ‘Hello, Rachel.’

  It never failed. Words of recognition melted her heart and cheered her no matter how dark and cold the day had been. It was the one advantage of speaking to him by telephone: she had the luxury of letting a happy tear streak down her face without worrying it would upset him.

  ‘Hi Dad. How are you?’

  ‘Oh, I’m fine, love, just fine. How are you, more to the point?’

  ‘I’m all right, Dad. Just a wee bit worried about you.’

  ‘Me? No need to worry about me. I’ll be fine. I’m a bit lost just now without your mum but she’ll be back soon. Don’t you worry, love.’

  ‘Okay, Dad, I won’t.’

  ‘Good girl. Now tell me, have you done your homework? You know what your mum’s like. She’s going to give you a hard time unless it’s all up to date.’

  It was her turn to be quiet. Not just because she was upset about him not knowing how old she was or that her mum was gone; but because it struck her how much better and simpler it was when all she had to worry about was getting her homework done on time.

  ‘It’s done, Dad
. I promise.’

  ‘Good. You’re a good girl, Rachel. I love you, you know.’

  ‘I know. And I love you too, Dad.’

  She wondered if he really did know how much she loved him. She didn’t say it enough and never had. Was it now too late for her to say it and be able to hope he’d remember?

  ‘Dad? Dad, are you still there?’

  Another silence filled the line. This time it didn’t end. Rachel put down the phone.

  CHAPTER 41

  The snow was flaking gently onto the steeple of the converted church that was Oran Mor when Narey hustled along from Hillhead subway station. Lunchtime groups were filing into the restaurants inside, some obviously dressed up for office Christmas lunches, and she could only wonder at the state the same well-attired people would be in later when Oran Mor’s neon halo lit the night sky.

  She couldn’t see Danny at first but then he stepped out from one of the building’s sepulchral shadows and through the throng towards her. There were people buzzing left, right and centre, shopping bags flying like weapons, but they simply bounced off Danny and on to their next victim as he strode forward to greet her with a hug.

  ‘Can you believe all these people?’ he asked. ‘Have they nothing better to do than shop, eat and drink?’

  ‘I don’t think they do. Come on, let’s walk down Byres Road.’

  Narey slipped her arm through Danny’s and they turned back onto the west end’s main thoroughfare. Oran Mor meant ‘the great melody of life’ in Gaelic and it had often occurred to Narey that the phrase applied equally well to Byres Road. It was the heart of the west end and home to some of its best pubs and shops. It was largely void of the global conglomerates that homogenised the city centre and instead let local businesses flourish, producing a quirky mix you didn’t get anywhere else. The eclectic mix didn’t apply just to the shops; students, arty types, boiler suits, middle-class mums and flat caps all strolled together cheek by jowl down its length.

  ‘I don’t know how you can live here, Rachel,’ Danny muttered. ‘It would do my head in. Having a couple of thousand people constantly living on your doorstep isn’t my idea of fun.’

  ‘Don’t be such an old grouch,’ she laughed. ‘You’re sounding as bad as Tony. I love it. There’s always a buzz along here and you’re in the heart of it all. Sometimes I just stand at the window of my flat and watch them all going by. You see some sights.’

  ‘Aye, I bet you do. But if I wanted to see a circus, I’d buy a ticket. It’s not even as if these clowns are funny.’

  ‘Some of them are.’

  ‘Aye, okay,’ Danny’s grumpy expression as he eased her between oncoming bodies suggested he didn’t entirely agree. ‘So did you get anything from Greg Deans’ home computer?’

  ‘Not a lot. Sure enough, the email was there from Justice, identical to the one you found on Paton’s PC. The follow-up saying they had to pay was sent to them separately but the messages said much the same thing. There was an email back from Deans asking who was emailing him but strangely enough the blackmailer didn’t want to tell him. Deans, gutted that his brilliant plan to uncover the fraudster didn’t work, told him to go do one. Unbelievably, that didn’t work either.’

  ‘And they let these bloody eejits teach kids? Did you get anything else?’

  ‘Nope. Nothing incriminating at all but we’ve taken it away and the hunchbacks in forensics are going to go over it to see if he’s left any fingerprints deleting anything.’

  ‘Right, well I won’t pretend I’ve any idea what that means except I guess it backs up his story.’

  ‘It does. I’m still going to do him for something before this is finished though – assuming he lives that long. So what is it you’ve got?’

  They were passing Hillhead station and a teenager was sitting on the ground in front of them, a folded newspaper keeping his bum from the snow, playing ‘Baker Street’ on the saxophone. He was very good but Danny still looked down at him as if he should be at school learning quadratic equations.

  ‘See what I mean,’ he told Narey. ‘Unfunny clowns.’

  ‘I’m not sure he was trying to be funny, Danny.’

  ‘Anyway, I’ve put out some feelers about Kyle Irving and got some feedback about the man’s finances.’

  ‘I’m not going to ask where you got this.’

  ‘No, you’re not. It seems that however many clients Irving has, it’s not paying the bills. That big old house in the south side comes with a hefty mortgage and he’s way behind on it. Losing the place is a definite possibility.’

  They’d stopped at the lights opposite Tennents Bar, where Highburgh Road became University Avenue, officially the biggest pain in the bum set of traffic lights in the city. Narey’s flat was opposite Tennents but, despite the fluttering snow, she didn’t want to go inside yet.

  ‘Let’s keep going,’ she told Danny. ‘And you keep telling me about Irving. By the time these bloody lights let us cross I should know everything.’

  ‘Well, our man Irving isn’t exactly rolling in the ill-gotten gains of his psychobabble. He’s behind on his car too and that big Saab might be going back whence it came. If it does, then he’ll struggle to get much of a motor right now as his credit rating is shot to hell. From everything I’m being told, Irving is officially skint.’

  ‘No question of any of this being wrong, I take it?’

  ‘None whatsoever. Let’s just say that the info is so sound you could take it to the bank.’

  ‘Right . . . It fits with the vibe I got when I went to his house. I definitely got a sense of financial struggles when I was at his place. He barely had any heating on, even though it was below freezing outside.’

  The green man had appeared at last and they crossed further down Byres Road, Narey just avoiding a cyclist who was apparently colour blind or just didn’t give a toss. There were a few people sitting at a table outside the Blind Pig despite the fact that it was cold enough to make brass monkeys distinctly uncomfortable. No weather seemed to be too cold to stop smokers from freezing their own balls off.

  ‘So any suggestions as to why Irving is broke?’ she asked Danny.

  He shrugged. ‘My guess is the ex-wife has rooked him but I don’t know for sure. I also had someone tell me Irving likes a bet, lots of bets. I don’t suppose it matters – bottom line is the guy has no money.’

  ‘Having no money makes people desperate.’

  ‘It certainly can do.’

  They walked in silence past the Western, Narey still hanging onto Danny’s arm. Thoughts of Deans being patched up in A&E after being thrown down the stairs at The Rock flooded through her head but she still couldn’t dredge up any sympathy for him no matter how hard she tried.

  ‘So how’s your dad doing?’

  ‘He won’t get any better, Danny.’

  ‘Let me put it another way. How are you doing?’

  ‘I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Rachel, you’re a lot better at asking questions than you are at answering them. I asked how you were.’

  ‘I heard you.’

  ‘Christ, you’re hard work. No wonder Tony’s so bloody miserable all the time.’

  ‘Hey,’ she laughed. ‘And he’s not miserable all the time.’

  ‘No, he’s a barrel of laughs, our Tony. Listen, love, I know better than anyone how hard it hit him when his mum and dad died but he should be past that by now. It’s not healthy for him to be so bloody morose. He should have been an undertaker rather than a photographer.’

  Narey punched him on the arm.

  ‘Leave him alone, Danny. Like you said, you know better than anyone that he’s not had things easy. Okay, so he deals with it in his own way but I think it’s . . . cute.’

  ‘Cute? Did you think Saddam Hussein was a wee bit cheeky or Fred West was adorable in a homicidal kind of way?’

  She arched her eyebrows at him reproachfully. ‘Out of order, Danny, even as a joke.’

  ‘I love the boy, Rachel. You know th
at. He’s like a son to me. He can photograph every dead body from here to Timbuktu if he wants – as long as he’s happy in his miserableness. And I reckon you make him happy.’

  Narey said nothing, just looked at her feet as they kicked through the dirty snow. There weren’t as many people down at the far end of the street; fewer shops equalled fewer crowds. She glanced across the road at the University Café and contemplated the benefits of a cup of tea, a plate of homemade lasagne and a chocolate snowball. She tugged on Danny’s arm and, seeing no traffic, dragged him across the road.

  The University Café was one of her favourite places in the city, virtually unchanged from when it had opened nearly a hundred years before and owned by the same family, the Verrecchias, from day one. As soon as they pushed through the doors, they were assaulted with heat and steam and the smell of food on the go. It was a mostly studenty crowd that was in and Narey smiled to herself at Danny’s mock dis approval. There was space in the corner at one of the narrow Formica tables and she sat at one of the flip-down red vinyl seats and patted the one next to her, knowing full well that he’d pretend to be put out.

  She opted for the lasagne and Danny ordered a fish supper on her recommendation. The students on the table next to them seemed to think it was still morning – maybe for them it was; fry-ups and breakfast rolls were the order of the day.

  ‘So does he make you happy as well?’ Danny asked her as if the previous conversation had never ended.

  ‘Can I ask you something, Danny?’ she replied.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Our neighbour there,’ she nodded towards the student nearest them, ‘has a morning roll with a sausage in it, right? So in the west of Scotland vernacular that is obviously a “roll ’n’ sausage”. My question to you is: does that mean a “roll and sausage”, a “roll on sausage” or a “roll in sausage”? I’ve never been sure.’