Pitch Black

by Alex Gray

  The vet’s surgery was situated in a small, pretty bungalow on a street full of similar residential homes. Maggie turned into the drive where a car park had long since replaced the original large front garden.

  ‘Right, out you come,’ she said and the cat gave a quizzical cry as it was lifted off the seat.

  Inside, the reception area smelt of disinfectant and a draught of cold air came from a passage beyond the front desk, making Maggie shiver.

  ‘Mrs Lorimer,’ she told the girl behind the counter.

  ‘Oh, yes, the stray cat. Just take a seat in the waiting room, Mrs Lorimer. The vet will see you shortly. Can you fill in this form while you’re waiting, please?’ The girl handed Maggie a black clipboard with a pen and paper attached.

  The waiting room was empty of other pets and their owners, thanks to the appointment system and, Maggie told herself, the holiday season. But there was a large aviary in one corner of the room housing a pair of brightly coloured budgies; their squawking soon had the cat on its feet, head craning forward, a low growl issuing from its throat.

  ‘Behave,’ Maggie told him. ‘You’ve to be good, now.’ Then she sighed at such a proprietorial remark. What did it matter if he growled or not? She’d not have any say in his behaviour for much longer.

  The radio was playing an old Abba number and Maggie found herself singing along as she drove home. The vet had promised to put up notices about the cat (who was not chipped and had not been a previous patient) and had given the animal a thorough examination. The sore back was the result of a dog bite, the vet had reckoned, showing Maggie a tiny hole puncturing the flesh. He’d given her antibiotics for the cat, who had purred and wrapped his front paws lovingly around the vet’s neck as he’d lifted him on to the scales.

  ‘Lovely puss,’ he’d laughed. ‘Glad you’ve found a good home,’ he’d added approvingly as Maggie had placed the animal carefully back into the plastic carrier.

  ‘D’you think we could keep him if the owners don’t turn up?’ she’d asked.

  ‘No reason why not,’ he’d replied. ‘But bring him back in for his injections if nobody claims him. He’s been somebody’s pet at one time. Been spayed, coat’s not in a bad condition. Maybe you’ll be lucky and find his owners. Or,’ he’d grinned at Maggie’s expression, ‘maybe you’ll be luckier and not find them at all.’

  *

  It was late when her husband finally reached home. No surprise, Maggie thought. A murder investigation took up so much time, and she should know. Lorimer had had his fair share of cases as Senior Investigating Officer over the years. Sometimes it irked Maggie that he had been overlooked for further promotion, though making the rank of Detective Chief Inspector in his thirties had been something to cheer about.

  ‘Hi, we’re through here,’ she called.

  Lorimer’s head appeared round the doorway and he grinned as he saw them together; a woman and ginger cat curled up companionably on the sofa.

  ‘Still here then, is he?’

  ‘Yeah. The vet says there’s no reason why we can’t keep him. If nobody claims him, that is,’ she added hastily.

  ‘Better give him a name, then. We can’t just keep calling him cat. How about Ginger?’

  Maggie made a face and shook her head.

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘How about Second Chance?’ Maggie suggested.

  Lorimer snorted. ‘Sounds like a racehorse.’ Then he paused, ‘Why not call him Chancer? That’s what he is after all, a right wee chancer.’

  Maggie looked up. Was there something of disapproval in her husband’s tone? Or had it simply been a particularly hard day? Whatever, he needed something pleasant to ease the worry lines etched across his brow, she thought in a rush of affection.

  ‘Okay, Chancer, off you go.’ Maggie stood up and let the cat slip off her knees. ‘Fancy some dinner or are you too tired?’ She came up close to Lorimer, arms entwining his waist, and felt his breath warm on her face.

  ‘Not that tired,’ he murmured, pulling her tightly against his body.

  ‘Sex-mad fool!’ she murmured into his shoulder teasingly, but shivered as her husband’s strong fingers traced the shape of her hips. Maggie closed her eyes as she felt his hardness against her, all thoughts of dinner vanishing as another sort of hunger commanded her senses.

  CHAPTER 6

  Jimmy Greer licked the salt from his lips. Crushing the crisp bag, he aimed it at an already overflowing waste bin but the bag unfolded itself mid-flight and landed well short of its target. No goal, he thought. Well, maybe he’d hit the mark with this latest story. Footballers’ wives had that double allure of belonging to a man’s world and still remaining glamour pusses, his editor had reminded him. They’d already sourced a picture of Janis Faulkner smiling into someone’s lens from her poolside sun lounger. It was true what they said, a picture was worth a thousand words and this one told a lovely little story of self-gratification. It almost begged the reader to indulge in a bit of Schadenfreude. Greer smiled to himself. He’d see what other tasty bits he could rake up while he was at it. The Gazette’s senior reporter turned back to his laptop. A few more words to knock out then he was out of here.

  Even with all the windows open, the newspaper office was stiflingly hot and underarm damp patches had spread like twin Rorschach ink blots across his blue shirt. Greer glanced at his watch. Time for a quick one in the press bar, he told himself, flicking the cursor to ‘save’. Just a wee half before Kelvin FC held their press conference. Greer chuckled to himself, wondering what spin their new manager would have for them and what stories his rival journalists would have for tomorrow’s editions. Well, his sources had brought him something better and he’d have an exclusive.

  The boardroom at Kelvin FC was a testament to the club’s long history. Founded in the late nineteenth century, its walls had echoed with the hopes and celebrations of Kelvin’s directors over three different centuries. Old photographs hung on the wood panelling, their teams lingering on for posterity. Names could still be matched with the faces staring forwards to whatever lens had captured their images, some of them remaining forever young, their aspirations cut off by one of the wars that had ravaged the twentieth century. Ron Clark glanced around the empty room. It was his favourite place inside the club, somewhere he could come and feel at home among all these sporting heroes. His last job had been with another First Division team but it had lacked the history of a club like Kelvin. Clark liked it here. Besides, he and Pat Kennedy understood one another.

  Chairs had been arranged in ranks facing the largest table behind which he’d placed the Kelvin Chair. This was a fine-carved affair, high backed with the club’s crest emblazoned upon it, a chair normally reserved for Kennedy during more formal occasions. But today it seemed fitting that he should take it himself. Sitting there might give him the confidence he did not presently feel. Or was it because he was unconsciously taking Pat’s place? And would he be trying to emulate the chairman’s tactics?

  The Kelvin manager shivered. He’d not felt as nervous as this before, even with a cup-winning match in prospect. But then, he told himself as he rubbed some warmth into his arms through his shirt sleeves, he’d never been involved in a murder investigation. Sometimes players were difficult to handle; temperaments could flare up on and off the pitch and more than once in his career he’d had to step in to settle some belligerent character who’d threatened them with the press. A few pub fights and (once) the father of a teenage girl had caused him some sleepless nights. On the whole the boys here were great. They turned up on time for training sessions, worked hard at their fitness regimes and mainly stayed out of trouble.

  But nothing like this had ever happened at Kelvin FC. There was absolutely no precedent for the murder of one of their star players. And, Clark thought sadly, a star who’d never even had the chance to put on a Kelvin strip. He recalled Pat Kennedy’s bitter words. We’ve paid Sunderland top whack for him and now all that money’s gone, the chairman had compla
ined. Clark had remained silent, shocked that Pat could begin to think about hard cash in the face of the footballer’s demise. What was money when a life had been so horribly cut off? But, he reflected, Pat seemed pretty obsessed by money these days. Ron’s own nephew, Davie, who had come up through Kelvin’s ranks and was now one of their regular defenders, had told him about the ill-feeling in the dressing room because of Kennedy’s insistence that they wouldn’t be paid extra for home wins next season.

  Clark looked up, his train of thought interrupted as the first of the journalists was shown into the board-room by Marie McPhail, Kelvin’s administrative officer. Rising to his feet, the manager nodded to the reporter from the Gazette. ‘Take a seat, will you. The others shouldn’t be long.’

  In truth the conference lasted a scant half-hour but for Ron Clark it seemed that it would never end. Questions about Nicko’s background came up, the reasons they’d had for paying all that money for him, whether he had any ideas about the man’s death to offer. The manager had shrugged his shoulders, bewildered that they’d think he could have any opinion whatsoever on the matter and wishing, not for the first time, that this particular press conference had not come within his remit as club manager. And as for getting in a mention of Jason White? That had been a non-starter.

  Eventually he’d shaken all their hands and seen them out at the entrance to the club. It had felt as if he were accepting condolences after a funeral.

  ‘Have the police been to see you?’ Ron Clark turned to see a thin, cadaverous figure standing a little apart from the other journalists. It was a man he had not recognised; familiar as he was with the sports writers, this one eluded him.

  Clark’s puzzled expression must have shown for the man thrust out a hand and gripped his own in a brief, damp clasp.

  ‘Jimmy Greer. The Gazette,’ he announced.

  ‘The police? No they haven’t,’ Clark replied.

  ‘They will.’ The reporter flicked one long finger against the side of his nose. ‘Trust me, they will,’ he repeated, then with a grin that showed a set of unhealthy stained teeth the reporter turned on his heel and headed for the car park.

  Ron Clark stood watching him for a few moments then he shivered, despite the sun beating down out of a cloudless blue sky. There was something about the man Greer that made him more than a little uneasy.

  He saw the floodlights looming over the motorway long before the actual stadium hove into view. Then some clever technology tilted the image and he was looking down at a manicured pitch, green beyond the dreams of any loving groundsman. Memories flooded back; the first time his dad had taken him to a league match. It had been Kelvin against Partick Thistle, he recalled, though what the score had been on that Saturday derby of long ago he simply couldn’t remember. Flashes of the occasion were all that remained: Dad hoisting him over the black, metal turnstile, the Bovril he’d spilt down his new jeans and the roars of the crowd that crushed him on all sides as they’d climbed up the stone staircase to sit side by side on worn wooden bucket-seats. His dad had been a keen Kelvin supporter and some of that must have rubbed off.

  Lorimer had played rugby at school, but he had always followed the progress of Scottish football. It was part of the male psyche, he thought, to know what fixtures were on and to remember the names of players, though these days that was becoming harder with all the foreign names mixed in with fewer and fewer Scots. Some of them, like Henrik Larsson, had stayed long enough to become feted almost as one of their own, but others were barely with a Scottish club for one season before they were off again.

  Kelvin FC was one of those clubs that had retained a following among Glaswegians that was both loyal and parochial. Never rising to the greatness of the Old Firm, the club had nevertheless acquitted itself well in all its long history. And that, of course, was the main reason for such ardent loyalty. From its inception, Glaswegians had supported the club with a fierce devotion that was still reflected on today’s websites. Lorimer was reading their latest offering right now.

  It took only seconds to realise that this link to the website had not been updated over the weekend. Lorimer grimaced. Well, what had he expected? That the Kelvin Keelies would have posted up information about Nicko Faulkner’s death? It was still holiday time, after all. Yet he’d expected something. After all, the transfer market had been hot for weeks and the new signings of Jason White and Nicko Faulkner had made headlines in more than just the sports section of the Gazette. White was one of the bad boys of the game, his name all too frequently in the tabloids for the wrong reasons. His flair on the park seemed to make up for his wayward bouts of antisocial behaviour though, at least as far as his past managers were concerned. Rumour had it that he’d been denied an English cap due to some of these incidents. How would he fare under the management of Ron Clark? The Kelvin manager was well respected in the game, one of those rare birds of passage, an articulate fellow who didn’t talk in clichés all the time. Lorimer chuckled to himself; Clark had been the despair of Jonathan Watson, the TV comic who had taken off so many of the prominent figures in Scottish football.

  Lorimer’s mouse clicked on the last of the website’s pages. At first sight it was simply a chat room for fans to have their say about the team’s progress. The last batch of correspondence was dated 3 July.

  Don’t know why they have to put up the season ticket again. How many bums are they going to lose off seats if they keep this up? It’s not as if we’re even in the SPL this season – Chris

  Well everyone says that Kennedy’s going to have to put more money into the club or it’ll be in trouble. Remember what happened to Airdrie? They had to crawl back up from Division Two after they’d gone broke – Danny

  Aye, and Falkirk. They nearly went bust too, didn’t they? Should’ve been in the Premier League as well, if it hadn’t been for the condition of Brockville – Chris Ancient history, pal. Though I suppose Kelvin’s not exactly state of the art, is it? – Danny

  ‘D’you want a cup of tea?’ Maggie’s voice broke into Lorimer’s thoughts.

  ‘Give me a minute. I’ll be right out,’ he called over his shoulder. He scrolled down to the last words on the page:

  Well they must have plenty of money if they’re throwing all that dosh at Nicko Faulkner. What d’you think? – Chris

  But the chat came to an abrupt end, the invisible Danny failing to respond and leaving that question dangling in the ether. What did he think? What was the consensus of opinion among the fans? Had Nicko been unpopular with any of them? Lorimer gave himself a shake. That was a dangerous train of thought. Looking for some weirdo who’d had a grudge was just daft. Mitchison was almost certainly correct in his assessment of Janis Faulkner: it was so obvious that she must have killed her husband, but still Lorimer sat at the computer wondering that perennial question: why?

  ‘It’ll get cold,’ Maggie murmured, her warm cheek against his. ‘Come on outside while it’s still light.’ Lorimer put his hand on her waist, ready to encircle it, but she was off with a laugh and he could only follow her out into the garden where two sun loungers lay waiting. From the depths of one of them an orange face looked up.

  ‘You again,’ he grinned. ‘Right wee chancer you are, pal.’

  The sky was still light, the treetops dark against a pinkish haze that signalled yet another sunny day tomorrow. Maggie scooped up the cat and flipped it back on to her lap in one easy movement as she lay back on the lounger. A tray with two mugs sat on top of an upturned plastic litter bin, Maggie’s improvised picnic table until such time as she could be bothered to buy a proper one. Lorimer couldn’t recall when the summers had been as hot as this one. Sitting out in their garden at the end of a working day had previously been more of a novelty; now it was a welcome routine. He closed his eyes against the brightness of the western sky and let his hand fall limply by his side. Somewhere in the shrubbery a blackbird’s liquid notes came through the twilight. He opened his eyes, glancing at the cat, but it was curled contentedly o
n Maggie’s knee, oblivious to any bird. That was good, he thought. Maybe it wouldn’t be a nuisance after all. The idea of the animal stalking one of their garden birds and sinking its claws into a bundle of feathers made him wince, he could almost feel the sharpness of the points as they bit into the struggling bird.

  Lorimer’s imagination took another leap, this time into a kitchen where human flesh had been pierced by sharp metal and where a man had bled to death. Had he been stalked? Had that been a calculated act of cruelty?

  The blackbird whistled again but this time Lorimer took no pleasure in hearing the bird and knew he would not recapture the peace he’d found on Mull until he’d come to find the truth behind Nicko Faulkner’s killing.

  CHAPTER 7

  ‘We are the Keelies!’ The rhythmic stamping of feet followed the refrain, echoing round the ground, then a huge cheer went up as their team ran out from the tunnel. Black-and-white scarves held high were waved in time to the chants, roars of approval met the loudspeaker’s announcement of each team member. It was the first game of the season, the sun shone out of a clear blue sky, the score sheet was still pristine and anything could happen. Kelvin Park almost had about it a carnival atmosphere; music blared from the tannoy as a huge panda bear lumbered up and down in front of the stands, its immense paws held out to the front row of wee boys, clamouring to touch their mascot. Their spirits at least had not been dampened too deeply by the sombre aspect of a player’s death. ‘And you can hear the crowd as we look out over Kelvin Park. There’s a sense of expectation in the air, don’t you think?’

  ‘I would agree with that. Kelvin FC playing at home to Queen of the South today surely have a real chance to go through this first round of the Bell’s Cup.’

  ‘You don’t think the Dumfries side will progress past this game into the next round of the cup, then?’