Dark Angels

by Grace Monroe

‘Lord, Lord, let’s start the cutting.’

  The lilt of his voice was high and poetic; it reverberated round the austere, windowless room. Patch had left Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis over fifty years ago, but living amongst the Sassenachs had not dulled his accent. Adhering still to the traditions of his childhood and a staunch member of the Free Church of Scotland, he compounded his position as an outsider. Social pariahs acknowledge one another, and like all fatherless children I collected father figures. I was as close as Patch would come to a friend, and it cut both ways.

  With the flourish of a magician, he yanked the sheet away. Lord Arbuthnot lay pale, naked and bloodless. The silence of the dead hung heavy in the room, as we came to terms with our own thoughts. I thought of the droves of reporters outside–how much would a photograph like this command? Perhaps Patch was thinking along similar lines as he shouted: ‘I don’t want anyone within fifty feet of this room, is that clear?’

  The young morgue assistant responded to his high sharp command, and shuffling off, replied: ‘I’ll see to it, sir.’ A dynamic nod followed, as he affirmed, ‘I’ll keep an eye out…I sure will.’ Hobbling out on his loose-laced skateboarding shoes, the young man did not return to the autopsy room.

  The four of us were left alone. Lord Arbuthnot hardly counted, although he was the reason we were there. My eyes explored inches of his exposed flesh at a time. Age had undermined his muscle tone and he lay flaccidly before us. Nonetheless, I could see that in his youth, he had been an athlete, and as my mother would have said prior to his demise, he was still ‘a fine figure of a man.’

  Ordinarily, death masks are peaceful. Lord Arbuthnot’s face seemed irate. Most of the blood had been washed from his body, but it was still accumulated between his fingers and under his nails. In life, I was sure his hands would have been immaculate–in death, they were downright grubby.

  ‘He literally bled to death.’

  Patch had read my mind–he had an uncanny knack of doing that.

  ‘Hardly a drop of the red stuff left in him.’

  His gloved finger pointed to a jagged scratch on Lord Arbuthnot’s neck.

  ‘Insignificant, isn’t it?’

  Patch was now poking into the small puncture hole.

  ‘I’ve had worse nicks than that shaving.’

  Frank Pearson’s mouth was slightly agape, staring incredulously at Patch’s actions.

  ‘Could that really be the cause of death?’ he asked.

  ‘It was the means by which he appears to have died. However, if Ms Coutts had merely placed her forefinger like so…’ Patch pressed down hard with his finger, ‘he would be alive…and looking down on us all.’

  Accidental death? My mind was racing ahead to petitioning the High Court for Kailash’s release from prison. I wasn’t really present in the room, my mind was so busy on the next job. I almost didn’t hear Patch speak again.

  ‘So simple to have saved him, to have saved the life of Scotland’s highest Law Lord.’

  Patch’s voice always got higher, when he was onto something. To my ears, he was almost squeaking. My heart was sinking as I knew that this case was just about to get difficult again.

  ‘Rudimentary first aid was all that was needed. A Girl Guide could have saved this man.’

  Patch was almost singing now.

  ‘I seriously doubt that Kailash Coutts was ever in the Girl Guides,’ I interrupted. ‘Although she’s probably got the uniform these days.’

  It was an off-the-cuff remark I was shortly about to regret.

  ‘Presumption rarely leads to the truth, Ms McLennan, and when you assume facts, you are invariably led on a wild goose chase.’

  Patch smiled at me condescendingly.

  ‘What evidence do you have that Ms Coutts was not a perfectly ordinary child?’

  ‘It was you who taught me, Professor, that aberrant behaviour in adults has its roots in childhood.’

  ‘How very Freudian of you, Brodie, but the aberrant behaviour you have accused your client of–is it murder or prostitution?’

  Frank Pearson stared at me like the adversary he was. I had forgotten he was there. At university he was so insignificant. Obviously the Fiscal’s office had honed his wits. I stared at him with a new respect.

  ‘Who’s the deviant?’ I asked, trying to regain lost ground. ‘The man who pays ten grand to get his arse whipped, or the woman who does it to him?’

  ‘I guess we’ll have to ask Roddie Buchanan that one,’ sniggered Frank. He caught himself quickly, clearly recognising it was inappropriate to be laughing as he stood over Lord Arbuthnot’s naked corpse.

  ‘If I may continue…’

  Patch spoke sternly as if addressing two school children. He switched on his tape recorder and spoke clearly.

  ‘Although, the entry wound is small…observe the jagged edges of the lesion…it would appear to be consistent with a blow from a broken glass…the downward serration…would indicate the glass was propelled from above the carotid artery…severing it immediately…the assailant was left handed…and strong.’

  Patch switched off the tape recorder. He never did that. It was against the standard operating procedure.

  ‘In view of the deceased’s position and status, details of this autopsy must be held under the strictest security.’

  He looked shiftily around. Clearing his throat he continued.

  ‘It has been proposed that the Lord Advocate may place a one hundred year banning order on some of the papers in this case.’

  ‘They can’t do that. It’s a murder trial.’ Frank Pearson sounded outraged.

  ‘They did it with the Dunblane Report initially,’ I reminded him. ‘They had no good reason to do that, and it would have remained sealed unless some people had fought to get it changed.’

  ‘Brodie, they didn’t have a trial there. Thomas Hamilton was shot dead after he massacred those children.’ Frank Pearson had forgotten himself, and was leaning across Lord Arbuthnot’s body. I was wincing at the sight of it, but we court lawyers love a good argument. The rights and wrongs get lost in the fight.

  ‘Thomas Hamilton was a paedophile. As far back as 1968 if talk is to be believed. Police officers had been questioning his right to run boys’ clubs for years. In particular, in 1991 a police report said he should be prosecuted for the way he ran his boys’ clubs, and his gun licence was revoked. But the report was returned marked “no-pro.” No prosecution by the Fiscal’s service, Frank, because, according to some–nonsense conspiracy theorists in your eyes, I’m sure–in the reports three other people were mentioned: two Scottish politicians and a lawyer.’

  Frank Pearson glared at me as I continued to shout at him across the cadaver.

  ‘The Fiscal’s office didn’t prosecute, Frank. And on 13 March 1996, Thomas Hamilton walked into Dunblane Primary School and shot sixteen children and a teacher…with a licensed gun.’

  I was so incensed, I was almost frothing at the mouth. The brutality of those murders had shocked the world but especially Scotland. Nothing like it had ever happened before or since, but I couldn’t understand the link here. Why was I being told the same thing might happen with my case as had happened with Dunblane? Lord Arbuthnot’s death didn’t justify a cover up just because he was a pillar of the establishment.

  ‘Why does this need to be confidential?’

  Patch turned to look at me. He seemed relieved that I had finally asked the question which needed to be spoken.

  ‘I understand that someone–I don’t know who–will have a “watching brief”.’

  I could tell that Patch would have felt more comfortable discussing such matters privately. Guilt stabbed at me. Like Fishy, he had been neglected by me. I figured he felt he had to speak to me now, or he might not get the chance again until the trial. It wasn’t a wise decision. A watching brief meant overseeing how events unfolded, and if anything untoward were to come out then the individual given it would have to act. What form that action would take, I had no idea.
A watching brief certainly explained Sheriff Strathclyde’s extraordinary behaviour at the judicial examination.

  Kailash Coutts was a powder keg, and everyone knew that she would not go down alone–as long as she didn’t take me with her, I felt I could cope.

  The whirr of the blade and the crunch of bone brought me back to reality. Patch had switched the tape-recorder back on and was cutting through Lord Arbuthnot’s ribcage. Snap, snap, and he was in. Stealthily, like a burglar, he reached inside, droning on into his microphone. I preferred not to listen, concentrating instead on blowing air onto my heated face.

  Scales were on the bench beside him. He plucked the still heart out of the body and placed it to be weighed. The ancient Egyptians believed that after death, your heart was weighed against a feather; if your heart was heavier you were not admitted to heaven. They understood that you had to receive joy and give joy, and they believed you should be rewarded or punished accordingly. To my fanciful eye, Lord Arbuthnot’s heart looked heavy on those scales. He didn’t give or receive joy from his father. Had he shared such an emotion with anyone else in his life?

  ‘I hardly knew the man in life–I didn’t like him then and I certainly don’t like him after dissecting him.’

  Patch sounded disapproving and it snapped me back to attention. It wasn’t hard to breach his moral code because of the strict tenets of his religion. In fact, it was a surprise to me that he tolerated my behaviour, although he did often say it was because I knew no better. I was sure that wasn’t a compliment.

  ‘As I said before, to have saved this man’s life would have been so straightforward. It turns out it was only a question of time anyway.’ None of the condemnation had left Patch’s voice.

  I followed him to the metal side table where he had placed the heart. Scalpel in hand, he progressed with the dissection, shaving slivers from the heart. He stained the shavings and invited us to look down the lens.

  Chivalry has no place in law. Frank Pearson moved forward to examine the slide first. Nervously, he cleared his throat, and again he coughed. Either he didn’t know what he was looking at or he was reluctant to say.

  ‘So, Frank, what do you see?’

  It was like an oral exam at university. I shifted uncomfortably. So many years had passed–he wouldn’t be able to remember. I didn’t want to risk putting myself in the same position.

  ‘Some fibres are missing their nuclei, indicating necrosis or death of the tissue.’

  ‘Very good, Frank.’

  Patch turned to face me.

  ‘Now, Brodie, what else can you see?’

  Reluctantly, I looked down the powerful microscope.

  ‘There’s inflammation, old scarring, and narrowing of the coronary arteries.’

  Lord Arbuthnot was sixty-four when he died–nothing unusual so far. I was missing something. There had to be evidence in the heart tissue of wrongdoing, that was the only phenomenon that could have incited Patch’s moral indignation.

  ‘Trust your intuition.’ He used to drum that into me. ‘It comes from your subconscious mind that knows far more than your little brain.’

  I relaxed, and spoke more freely. It was obvious once I stopped looking at a Law Lord and just saw a corpse.

  ‘His heart tells us more than that. It tells us in death what he would never have wanted us to know in life,’ I coldly stated.

  ‘Lord Arbuthnot was a chronic drug abuser.’

  ELEVEN

  I could hear Frank Pearson’s sharp intake of breath. I had committed myself so I might as well carry on.

  ‘Chronic ischemia, fibrosis of varying age, plus an absence of coronary artery disease or cardiomegaly, and patchy necrosis…basically a coke heart.’

  ‘Well done, Brodie,’ said Professor Patterson. I glowed under his approval. I had won the prize for forensic medicine at the Old College, and Patch had hoped at the time that I would take it further. Maybe I would have had it not been for two things–the desire of my mother to see me as a lawyer, and my own preference for the vibrancy of the living–with all their flaws–rather than the stench of the dead.

  I looked across at Frank. He had wilted under my display, and his newfound confidence had left him. The words of Jack Deans came back into my head–I didn’t want to make any more enemies than were strictly necessary.

  I caught Patch’s eye, silently pleading with him to bring me down a peg or two.

  ‘Of course, it’s not strictly correct, Brodie…’

  Frank heaved a sigh of relief.

  ‘Drugs such as narcotics, synthetic narcotics, whatever the addict can get their hands on, will destroy the heart just as effectively as cocaine. Elvis Presley is a sad example…’

  Patch’s voice trailed off on the slight technicality as a smile lit my face. Elvis was his one failing. In terms of the ‘Wee Free Kirk’, any singing or joviality is frowned upon. Patch had to keep his infatuation with the King well hidden from the brethren.

  Slowly, it sunk in. The Lord President of the Court of Session was a cokehead. I found it hard to believe, but the toe tags confirmed that it was indeed Alistair MacGregor, aka Lord Arbuthnot, lying there on the slab. And I had seen inside his body with my own eyes. At least it explained why he had fallen out with his father. Why his father thought he was unsuitable material to be a judge. Old man MacGregor went up in my estimation; it was a hard step to take to report your own child, but that must have been the real reason behind their argument.

  ‘Why was this information not known?’

  Frank Pearson looked as I felt–shell-shocked.

  Patch was staring despairingly at us.

  ‘Again you are assuming facts. How do you know that it was not known? Simply because this is news to the people in this room does not mean it was unknown to others.’

  Patch is always pedantic; right but hair-splitting. Unless, Lord Arbuthnot was manufacturing the narcotics himself, someone had to know.

  ‘If the authorities knew about it, then they should have made him resign.’

  Frank’s voice was indignant, but quiet; as if he was mindful that no one outside the room should hear of this.

  ‘What about blackmail? He left himself wide open to it.’ I stated what we were all thinking.

  ‘There’s no evidence that he was being blackmailed.’ Frank Pearson looked annoyed with me for even having mentioned it.

  ‘Funny though…when you consider…’ Patch was wandering, but a point would arrive soon. ‘The MacGregors were the original blackmailers.’

  He ignored my warning glances.

  ‘It’s true. The MacGregors stole cattle and “sold” it back to their owners. Rob Roy MacGregor was a blackmailer. Poetic justice if it happened.’

  It wasn’t enough that Patch had revealed to us the flaws of character in the present MacGregor, he sought to destroy a legend as well. I could see that he was enjoying himself, so I did not react. One thing did concern me–Patch had switched his tape-recorder off again, and none of this information regarding the heart was being recorded. Patch was meticulous, he would not have done this by accident. Either he had made a decision, or someone had made it for him. This information was going no further.

  The chest cavity on the cadaver was still open. Patch, bloody after his earlier excavations, was looking over both his shoulders. He moved cautiously forward, towards Lord Arbuthnot’s feet. Then he placed his hands on the deceased’s hips, and rolled him in my direction.

  Horrified, I stepped back, Patch’s irreverence knew no bounds. The body groaned as gases escaped, pressure widened the hole in the chest wall and I could see right inside. I knew that I would be having nightmares about this for weeks to come.

  ‘Stop lolly gagging over there and come and see this.’

  Patch was staring at Lord Arbuthnot’s backside. I could see no way that this could get any worse. Frank Pearson was already green to the gills, and if there had been others present I would have been running a book on how much time he had left before he was sick
. I shouldn’t have been so smug.

  At first I couldn’t make out what I was looking at. It was faded with age. Patch swung his large magnifying glass in front, and we stared mystified.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘What does it look like?’ Patch sounded irritated by my puerile question.

  ‘It looks like a tattoo,’ Frank replied, unabashed.

  ‘Well, it’s not. It’s a burn.’

  ‘Like a cattle brand?’ I had found my voice again.

  ‘Precisely!’

  The autopsy room fell silent. Far away in distant corridors, I could hear the rattle of trolleys. Porters shouted greetings to one another, normal life continued. In this room, it had stopped; nothing was as it should be. We stared in quiet communion at the mark, burned long ago into the rear end of Lord Arbuthnot.

  ‘Have you ever seen anything like it?’ The words tripped softly out over my lips.

  ‘I have obviously seen burn marks on children made by cigarettes and heated objects,’ answered Patch, ‘but I have never observed first hand such a brand. Note these indentations–also old burn marks.’

  Patch’s plum eyelid twitched, as he observed the oddity. His curiosity was aroused, but from past experience, I knew he would add nothing to his disclosures. We were lost to him now as he studied the grooves and indentations on the flaccid, bloodless, buttock.

  I felt the vomit rise into the back of my throat, acidic and sour it burned its way up my gullet. Fire flushed through my system. Last time, I barely made it to the ladies room. The race was on, no time for niceties. I grabbed my helmet off the steel table by the mortuary room door. I had no time to say goodbye, or to hear Frank Pearson’s muffled guffaw.

  The place was a maze. I ran directionless through the corridors, searching for a toilet. No luck, so I pushed down hard on a fire exit handle, praying it wasn’t alarmed, and escaped into the fresh air of the car park.

  The autopsy room had been windowless; the storm clouds outside took me by surprise. My lungs gasped for cool clear air, but to no avail: the afternoon was warm and muggy. A summer storm was building. My t-shirt clung to my back; small streams of sweat ran down my neck, as I sprinted towards Awesome. The sun was hidden behind heavy clouds, and even Awesome gleamed dull in the flat light. The shine had been taken off everything.