Pitch Black

by Alex Gray

  Cameron raised his eyebrows. It sounded far too easy, the way Lorimer described it.

  ‘The gunman could have fired the shot from a car parked by Cartwright’s driveway, though, couldn’t he?’ he asked thoughtfully.

  ‘True,’ Lorimer replied with an approving nod in the DC’s direction. Cameron was evidently using his imagination, trying to make a visual reconstruction of the scene in his head. That was good. The young man from Lewis had the makings of an excellent detective, Lorimer told himself. ‘So far there’s nothing to show if he was on foot or not. Hopefully that’ll change. It also makes sense to see who else lived in the same neighbourhood as the victim,’ Lorimer went on. ‘We’ll see if there’s any link there. And if the house-to-house eventually turns up a witness …’ He left the rest of the sentence hanging in the air.

  Niall Cameron nodded his head. A whole lot of legwork had to be done before any tangible results might be found. They were heading back for a meeting with other members of the investigation team before Lorimer set out other lines of inquiry for them to follow. Cartwright’s workplace, his family and friends – all of these would be subject to police scrutiny. The detective constable stifled a yawn. It was only Monday but it felt as though he’d done a week’s work already.

  CHAPTER 11

  Lorimer looked carefully at the report to the Fiscal. It wasn’t mandatory by law for him to have this document in his hand, but Rosie usually made sure he had sight of her reports in cases of murder, anyway. As he skimmed past the bits about issuing a death certificate he mentally blessed the blonde pathologist for her cooperation.

  Norman Cartwright had died as a result of a shotgun wound to his skull: fragments of bone and shotgun pellet had penetrated the soft tissues resulting in trauma to the brain. In other words, Lorimer thought, instant death. Rosie’s report included detailed descriptions of the entry wound and the pieces of shotgun pellet that had been removed from the victim’s head. As she had already suggested at the scene of crime, the assailant had been only a few feet away, probably right on the pavement of Willow Grove. Lorimer read on. The angle of entry suggested that the gun had either been fired from a parked car or the gunman had crouched down, military style, to shoot his target. Pity none of Cartwright’s neighbours remembered seeing a gunman flee the scene, he thought wryly, but one or two had mentioned cars passing along the street after the shot had been fired. That meant nothing, though, without a more definite link to the incident.

  Meantime, the team was scouring the Glasgow streets for any information that could be gleaned. Previous shootings of this type would be examined but it was never going to be easy to identify a specific gunman: shotguns were licensed to so many folk around the country and they would have to concentrate their search on those in the immediate area.

  Something would turn up eventually, he told himself, in an attempt to bolster his confidence. It usually did.

  Netta Cartwright sat clutching her handkerchief tightly, rocking back and forwards, a soft moan coming from somewhere deep inside her throat. Beside her the woman in black watched helplessly, her own face creased in pain. Having to identify Norm’s body had been horrible but having to come here to tell Mum … Well, someone had to do it and of course it would be her, Joan Redmond thought. It was always her. On the few occasions that her brother had visited the nursing home, Mum had shown wee signs of recognising him, but on her own daily visits there was nothing. Until today. After she’d broken the news the old woman had turned to her and put up her hands in disbelief saying, ‘Oh, Joan! Oh, no!’ Then she’d lapsed into this quiet keening.

  The police had been nice to Joan; that big tall man especially, the one who was in charge. There had been cups of tea and these trips back and from the mortuary in a big car. Yes, that had been nice of them, she thought. Pity they couldn’t have been here to tell Mum … Her eyes filled with tears that she dashed away with the back of her hand. This was only self-pity, wasn’t it? Or was she crying, like Mum, for the football-mad wee boy they could both remember?

  Norman Cartwright had been an exemplary employee, according to the human resources manager. No record of poor timekeeping, few days lost through ill health and his work records always up to date. His nine-to-five existence in this government department belied the man who had scampered up and down the length and breadth of Scottish football pitches every weekend. ‘A real stickler,’ one of his fellow Scottish Football Association officials had told the officer who had called to ask about Norman Cartwright. ‘Didn’t stand any nonsense,’ he’d added. That certainly tied in with the man’s last match, one that would go down in the annals of football history for several reasons.

  Lorimer looked at the sheets of paper before him. ‘Good to his mum,’ was how his sister, Mrs Redmond, had described him. So, if they were to look anywhere for a reason why Norman Cartwright had been murdered it would seem that they had to concentrate on that game in Kelvin Park after all.

  Glancing at his watch, Lorimer saw that it was after nine o’clock. Maggie would have eaten long since, he supposed, feeling the hollow sensation in his empty stomach. And it wasn’t fair to abandon her for hours like this. With a sigh that became a yawn, he decided to leave work for the night. Maybe tomorrow would throw something new into the mass of paperwork that lay on his desk, something that gave a clue into the killing of a football referee.

  CHAPTER 12

  It was still light when Jason staggered into the doorway of the club. ‘Out!’ The huge figure of Tam Baillie made to lunge at him but then stopped. ‘Oh, it’s you. Aw right then. Sorry.’ And Tam, the bouncer, stepped aside to allow the footballer past.

  The bouncer regarded Jason thoughtfully as he pushed his way into the brighter lights and music within. White hadn’t learned his lesson, then? Tam’s bushy eyebrows expressed a modicum of surprise. Some folk never learned, though, did they? With a shrug he turned back to regard the city street. Wasn’t any of his business, but after Saturday’s game and the referee’s shooting you’d have thought even Jason White would have been keeping a low profile. Tam took out his mobile and tapped out the number he’d been given.

  ‘Aye, he’s here. Just like you said. I’ll keep an eye on him. Okay?’ The bouncer pocketed the phone and turned back to the street. Couldn’t blame his gaffer for wanting to check up on him, could he?

  The footballer blinked as he moved on to the dance floor. It was the second club he’d been in tonight. The first one had provided enough drink to get him going but none of the women had taken his fancy so he’d decided to move on. For once, Jason White was on his own. Normally he’d be accompanied by one or other of his mates, hangers-on who revelled in the glamour the footballer seemed to trail around him. But tonight Denis had cried off with the excuse that he had bad toothache and Jerry was down south on some business of his own. Were they deliberately avoiding him after last week’s fracas? For a moment he thought about it. Maybe his mates hadn’t liked seeing him being carted off in a police car. Or maybe they’d been spoken to by someone from the club. So what? Kennedy’s tirade had fallen off him like water off a duck’s back. Mentally he gave two fingers to the Kelvin chairman. It would piss him off if he knew he was here. What if he did frequent the clubs a bit more than the average player? He wasn’t like them, anyway. He had star quality. That’s what all the sports journalists were fond of writing, after all.

  Jason sidled up to a blonde whose evenly clipped hair swung straight and smooth around her elfin face as if she’d ironed it specially in the hope of meeting some guy just like him. Jason jiggled up to her, moving his body suggestively and smiling his famous-footballer smile. She knows who I am, he told himself, the girl’s sparkling eyes and tiny giggle giving it away. Her carefully made-up face shone with translucent blusher and she dropped her eyes coyly, revealing twin crescents of iridescent pink eyeliner. He pulled up the sleeves of his Armani jacket and danced towards her, making her shift back a little so that he took centre stage. He closed his eyes, knowing that when h
e opened them he’d see that adoring look they all had. Stupid cows! Still, he got what he wanted and they took home a story to tell their mates. I got pulled by Jason White! And if a few bruises took a while to settle down, so what? Girls liked a bit of rough with their tumble, didn’t they?

  Kelvin Park lay quiet under the darkening Glasgow skies. The car park was empty but one vehicle was parked beyond the main entrance, tucked out of sight from anyone who might be passing by. A man stopped by the metal gate and put his hand on to the padlock, giving it a slight shake, then, when there was no sound but the susurration of a little night breeze, he drew out a key and silently opened it. His footfall was silent as he crept towards the front door, nor was there any sound when he unlocked it. Only a tiny creak upon the ancient wooden stairs gave any hint to his presence as the man made his way up. But that didn’t matter, he smiled to himself. They’d never hear a wee thing like that, not with the all-too familiar racket he could hear coming from beyond the chairman’s office door.

  He moved forward towards the passage near the top of the staircase and stopped, listening. Her moans sounded real enough, he chuckled to himself, stupid bitch wasn’t even faking it. Then he stiffened as the woman’s lover gave a shout that collapsed into a groan of relief.

  They wouldn’t be much longer, he told himself, slipping back into the shadows: a quick post-coital drink from Kennedy’s private bar then they’d be leaving. She’d take a taxi, he knew that by now, all these evenings spying on them having paid off. The big man would slip into his Jag and be off back to his wife. Working late again, dear? she’d maybe ask him. He stifled a real desire to laugh as he made his way back into the night. Barbara Kennedy was in for a real shock one of these days, but it could wait till he was ready to deliver it: one more item on his insurance policy.

  There was a sudden vibration from the mobile in his pocket.

  ‘Yes?’ he asked gruffly.

  The voice on the other end told him what he wanted to know. Within minutes he was out of the darkness and into the brightly lit streets, heading towards his quarry.

  It was dark by the time Jason was ready to go home. Candy (was that really her name or had she just made it up to impress him?) was in the ladies’ toilet and Jason was lounging against the wall outside, his head ringing with the music, his body still swaying to the beat that throbbed from the nightclub. After a few minutes he pulled up a pink cuff to glance at his watch. Where the hell was she? Jason glanced back to the open doorway only to catch the bouncer regarding him with an expression of pity.

  ‘What are you looking at?’ he snarled at the bouncer, fists clenching in a reflex action. In the distance a siren whined, reminding him of that other night and, for once, sense prevailed. With the amount he’d drunk tonight he was no match for this guy. Directing a last glance towards the door, Jason shook his head. She wasn’t coming out, after all. Another waste of time, all come-on and no delivery. Well, he wasn’t in the mood now, anyway, so sod her and all the other bitches that made eyes at him but kept their distance.

  Jason turned on his heel, attempting a deliberate swagger. He tripped instead, and cursed as the back of his hand grazed the stone wall, then, hearing laughter from the doorway, he spun round to see who was jeering at him. The bouncer had turned his head away, discretion being the better part of valour. Swearing again, Jason plunged into the shadows that loomed over the alleyway and headed towards the light of the street and the first available taxi.

  Tam watched the footballer go. ‘Eejit!’ he muttered under his breath. The Kelvin player was going to hell on a handcart as far as he could see. ‘Waste of good talent,’ he told the night air, shaking his head. He’d been a Kelvin supporter all his days but on nights like this Tam Baillie’s loyalty could be sorely tested.

  The street was deserted when Jason rounded the corner of the alley. Looking up and down the street he could see the shop windows shuttered and still, only the lights of security cameras blinking from the darkened frontages. Squaring his shoulders, the footballer set off towards the city centre and the vague memory of a taxi rank. He hadn’t been in this city long enough to know his way around much, and, besides, it was usually Jerry or Denis who organised things like taxi rides home.

  The night air was cool against his face after the heat in the club and Jason gave a sigh that was partly relief and partly resignation at his failure to score with that girl, Candy. Stupid name, stupid cow, he muttered to himself, aiming a kick at an empty lager can that had been abandoned in the middle of the pavement. The sound of its metallic clanking as it skittered into the gutter seemed to resonate in the silence of the empty street. An echo – was it an echo? – made him turn around.

  A figure stepped out of the shadows by the alley, walked towards him, then stopped.

  Puzzled, Jason hesitated. Then he saw a hand raised, stretched out towards him.

  The footballer’s eyes widened in horror as a glint of light reflected off the gun.

  There was no sound, no explosion bringing a crowd of people running, only a roar of light inside his head and a kick that carried the footballer off his feet. For a moment his limbs flailed in mid-air as if he were struggling to reach an elusive ball, then his body crumpled and hit the ground with a dead thud.

  Nobody saw the figure that slipped back into the shadows, leaving the street as silently as it had arrived.

  CHAPTER 13

  The journey to HMI Cornton Vale prison had taken more than an hour this time. On a whim, Marion had chosen to drive along the country road through places she rarely saw these days, like Balloch and Buchlyvie. Now, stuck behind a tractor on a winding stretch of road, she regretted that moment of caprice. Squinting against the morning sun, she could visualise her sunglasses lying on the kitchen table. Fat lot of good there, she thought. Forgot them in all that hurry to ferry Caroline to the day nursery, Marion scolded herself. What was wrong with her these days? Was it true that part of a mother’s brain shut down after giving birth or was it simply that she was trying to juggle too many balls in the air? What was she trying to prove? That she, Marion Peters, BA, LLB, could cope with the joint responsibility of motherhood and prospective partnership in one of Glasgow’s leading law firms, a defiant little voice answered her. Other women managed it, didn’t they? Women like the senior partner who managed somehow to have three kids and always appear immaculately turned out, Marion reminded herself with a twinge of envy.

  Still, she shouldn’t be late for this meeting. The prison had set aside a time for her to see Janis Faulkner and she had other duties waiting for her back in the office. That was probably why she’d taken this route, Marion realised. It was a form of escape. But, right now, all she wanted was to get away from this ruddy tractor.

  Peeking round the edge of the tractor’s massive wheels, Marion Peters gave a sigh. There were more cars coming in their direction. Mentally she apologised to the drivers in the line of traffic snaking behind her (they would all be men and they would all be cursing her) but in truth, there was nothing she could do about it.

  Suddenly a pale blue BMW appeared out of nowhere, overtaking three cars plus the tractor, roaring into the lead and narrowly missing an oncoming silver saloon.

  Marion’s hands gripped the steering wheel in a moment of terror.

  ‘Wanker!’ she yelled and was gratified to see the same expression of disbelief etched on the face of the driver of the silver car as it passed.

  For the next few minutes she resigned herself to the tractor’s pace until, thankfully, it turned left at the end of the road.

  Marion was already ten minutes late as she swung on to Stirling’s ring road and headed through the town centre, past Tesco and into the Cornton area. Her heart was still thumping, but now it was with a sense of growing excitement. Could it be that she might manage to have the charge against her client dropped? And would this latest murder alter everything for the woman who was languishing so silently within these prison walls?

  Janis read the newspaper wit
h shaking hands. ‘Three Murders at Kelvin’ the headline proclaimed before going into details about Nicko, Mr Cartwright the referee, and now Jason White. For a moment Janis tried to remember if they had met this boy-about-town as the journalist had described him, but she could not recall the face that stared out at her from the front page of the Gazette. What she saw was a good-looking man of about her own age with close-cropped hair, his friendly grin belying all the facts that were being spread down these column inches. He’d been a gambler, was used to mixing with dubious company … She read on. Recently the footballer had been charged with assault and had missed Kelvin’s opening match against Queen of the South as a result, a crime that seemed to gain disproportionately more lines than his other misdemeanours. And now he was dead, shot by an unknown Glasgow gunman. But it was the writer’s thinly veiled hints that had caused Janis’s hands to shake. Was he really suggesting that all three murders had been committed by the same person – that someone had a massive grudge against the club? She looked for the byline. Who was this Greer fellow, anyway? Was it the same reporter who’d made her look like a right little money-grubbing tart? If so, then he’d fairly changed his tune.

  Janis raised her eyes and looked out of the square window towards the Wallace Monument and the hills beyond. Whoever he was, Jimmy Greer might well become her guardian angel. Her mouth curled into a tentative smile. Perhaps it was time to begin to speak again. And maybe it would be no bad thing to start with Mrs Marion Peters.

  ‘Bit of a change in that one,’ the prison officer remarked, walking past the closed door of the small room that led off from the prison’s reception area. The interior of each room was visible due to the half-glazed door giving on to the corridor, but nothing of the conversation that was taking place could be heard. That was one advantage a prisoner’s lawyer had over police officers: they were permitted to have private discussions alone with their client. The other woman glanced into the room. It was true. Janis Faulkner seemed almost animated for the first time since she had arrived at Cornton Vale. It wasn’t that unusual for prisoners to be withdrawn and scared in the early days of their remand, but this one seemed to have come back to life pretty suddenly. With a shrug of her shoulders, the prison officer moved on; her mind was already on other responsibilities, but a faint look of puzzlement remained on her face.