All That's Dead

by Stuart MacBride

  Steel leaned forward in her chair, making it creak. ‘Bit of a mouthful.’ She snatched the photo from Logan’s hands. ‘I’m all for playing Kinky Librarian and the Overdue Book, but there are limits, eh? Mind you,’ she nudged King in the ribs, ‘bet she’s a filthy minx when she lets herself go. That sort always is.’

  Mr Sabre retrieved the photo. ‘Quite. I took the liberty of calling up the security footage from her last visit before Haiden disappeared.’ He fiddled with his computer, setting a video playing on the screen, then scooted his chair to one side so they could get a better look.

  The camera must’ve been ceiling mounted, going by the angle, looking down on a small round table, with four chairs arranged around it. Haiden was facing the camera, staring straight across at his visitor as if he was a starving Labrador and she was a whole packet of pork-and-stilton sausages. Mhari Canonach Powell’s pale-beige hair hung in a veil in front of her face, and she tucked it behind her ears before lunging forward to snog the living hell out of Haiden. Full-on face-eating snogged him.

  Steel grinned. ‘Told you: Julie Andrews in the streets, Stormy Daniels in the sheets.’

  Then a prison officer moved in to break it up, making them sit in their respective seats.

  Sabre pointed as Mhari composed herself again. ‘It’s the oldest trick in the inmate handbook. Significant other pays a visit, concealing drugs about their person. Passes it over during a passionate kiss, and the offender either swallows it or palms it – hand into the pants, and up his, or her, bum it goes for retrieval later.’

  Steel winked at King. ‘That’s called “cheeking” in polite society.’

  ‘Only, every time we strip-searched Haiden, he was clean. They weren’t passing contraband, it genuinely was just kissing.’ A shrug. ‘Now that might not seem like a big deal to you, but I’ve lost count of the number of mother-son tonguing sessions we see on a weekly basis. So it rather stood out.’

  King produced a Police Scotland business card and snapped it onto Sabre’s desk. ‘Can you email that footage to me?’

  ‘Of course.’ He pocketed the card. ‘Now, is there anything else we can help you with? At HMP Grampian we believe in—’

  ‘Fairytale of New York’ blared out of King’s pocket. ‘Oh for God’s sake, what now?’

  Sabre stared at him, mouth pinched. ‘You’re not supposed to have that in here: all phones have to be left at reception. I told you that when we came through security!’

  ‘Sorry. Sorry.’ He dug it out and killed the call. ‘I didn’t mean to—’

  ‘We take security very seriously here! It’s a prison.’ Voice cold and aloof, nothing like the man who’d congratulated Archie on achieving a National 5.

  King put his phone away, pink rushing up his cheeks. ‘I must’ve grabbed it from the tray after the X-ray machine. Force of habit.’ A pained smile and a shrug. ‘Sorry.’

  Logan tried hard not to sigh. ‘Do you have an address for Mhari?’

  Sabre produced a sheet of A4 from his in-tray. ‘I took the liberty of listing everyone’s addresses from the visitors’ book.’ He gave the printout to Logan and a withering look to King. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll get someone to escort you back to reception. I have work to do.’

  And it had all been going so well.

  19

  A large prison officer waved them off, as Logan, King, and Steel stepped out through the front doors and into the early evening sun.

  The only sounds were the raucous skirl of the seagulls and the drone of supply vessels making for the harbour exit.

  King stopped, throwing his hands out to the sides. ‘I forgot I had it on me, OK?’

  Steel shook her head. ‘Kingy, Kingy, Kingy …’

  Which was a lot more polite than Logan would’ve been. He pointed at her. ‘Go run a PNC check on Mhari, see if she’s got prior with Haiden. And then get on to the care home – I want to know if anyone matching Haiden’s description has visited Gary Lochhead in the last couple of weeks.’

  ‘Gah …’ She stomped off, pulling out her phone. ‘Slave-driving tosspot cock-muppet …’

  Logan marched back to the car.

  King hurried to catch up. ‘Honestly, it was a simple mistake anyone could’ve made.’

  You keep telling yourself that.

  Logan checked the printout. ‘Closest is the old lady, lives locally. The schoolteacher is just outside Fraserburgh. Ex-wife’s in Stonehaven. Girlfriend’s in Pitmedden.’

  ‘Only one worth rattling: the girlfriend. Think our boy Haiden’s hiding out at her house?’

  ‘Only if his dad’s right and he really is an idiot. Always bound to be the first place we’d check …’ A shrug. ‘Worth a go, though. But if there’s even a tiny chance he’s there, we have to call for backup.’

  ‘True.’ King turned to squint out at the huge orange-and-white supply vessels. ‘Mind you, if he’s bright enough to leave a forensically neutral crime scene, is he really going to be moronic enough to hide out at his girlfriend’s? Be a huge waste of time and resources getting a dog team and OSU and all the rest involved. Never mind the paperwork.’

  ‘You want to risk it? Because speaking as a member of Professional Standards …’

  ‘Yeah. You’re probably right.’ King dug out his contraband phone and poked at the screen, wandering onto the yellowy grass as he held it to his ear. ‘Milky? … No, it’s me … How many times do I have to say I’m sorry? … Milky— … No, Milky— … Look, can you get me the number for Ellon police station … Please.’

  Yeah, good luck with that. Knowing Milky, she wouldn’t be letting him in off that particular high ledge for a long time. If there was one thing Yorkshiremen and Yorkshirewomen excelled at, it was holding a grudge.

  Steel wandered over, her shirt unbuttoned down to the bra line, flapping both sides to get some air circulating around her …

  Logan closed his eyes and shuddered. Best not to think about it. When he opened them again she was standing right in front of him, still flapping.

  She nodded at King – pacing about in the middle distance. ‘Can you believe that numpty?’

  ‘What did the Police National Computer say?’

  ‘Imagine smuggling a phone into prison. Everyone knows heroin’s where the big money is. Lot easier on the bumhole too.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘Any idea how hard it’d be to get a charger up there?’

  ‘Leave DI King alone, he’s having a hard enough time as it is.’

  ‘You meaning the Alt-Nat terrorism thing, or the cheating wife thing?’

  How on earth did she know?

  ‘Oh don’t look at me like that.’ Steel untucked her shirt and gave the sides an extra-strong flap, exposing pale belly skin as well. ‘I used to be a Detective Chief Inspector, remember? Course I know things.’ A couple more flaps. ‘PNC says: Mhari Canonach Powell, twenty-two, arrested during an anti-Trump rally in Newcastle last year.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Who can remember? Got off with a fine in any case. Other than that, she’s a model citizen. DVLA says she’s got an ancient white Nissan Micra registered at her address in Pitmedden – never had a speeding or parking ticket.’ An unwholesome smile slithered its way onto Steel’s shiny face. ‘Too good to be true, to be honest. Needs dirtying up a bit.’

  ‘Just don’t, OK?’ Logan pulled his peaked cap down, shading his eyes. ‘What about Gary Lochhead’s visitors?’

  ‘Didn’t have any. Not a one. Well, no’ unless you count his CJ social worker, but she’s a woman and she’s only been twice. And before you ask – no, it wasn’t Haiden in a dress. Gaelic Gary’s got nae mates.’

  So they were no further forward on the ‘why now?’ front.

  King returned from his sticky tarmac pacing. ‘Sergeant Winston can give us a patrol car now, but if we want an Operational Support Unit we’re going to have to wait till nine at the earliest.’

  Nine?

  ‘Suppose we could hang around till then.’ Not exactly id
eal, though. Logan unlocked the car and climbed in. Cranked up the air conditioning.

  King got in the back. ‘What if he’s been and gone, by then? What if he hears we were at the prison?’

  ‘He’ll do a runner. Unless we go down there and stake her house out? Assuming he’s even there.’

  Steel groaned her way into the passenger seat, shirt held open over the blowers as they pumped cold air into the car. ‘You lumpies are kidding, right? We’re no’ sodding about outside some manky wee house in Pit-bloody-medden till nine!’

  ‘At the earliest.’ King fastened his seatbelt, voice dripping with condescension. ‘This is what police work is like, Detective Sergeant Steel. Waiting. Watching. That’s how we catch people.’

  She curled her lip at him. ‘Don’t patronise me, Kingy. I was running murder investigations while you were still in short trousers, sucking your mummy’s—’

  ‘All right,’ Logan held up a hand, ‘that’s enough. We’re staking out Mhari Powell’s house till backup arrives, and that’s an end to it.’

  ‘Nooo …’ She slumped in her seat. ‘Nine o’clock …’ A groan. ‘For the record: I hate the pair of you.’

  In the rear-view mirror, King scowled. ‘Join the queue.’

  Logan pulled up, two doors down, behind a half-empty skip, and killed the engine. Mhari Powell’s house was a bland cut-and-paste bungalow, hidden away in a curling cul-de-sac on the outskirts of Pitmedden. Brown-grey harling on the walls; grey, lichen-acned tiles on the roofs; satellite dishes like drooping mushrooms; backing onto woods and flanked by fields of brittle yellow barley.

  King peered through from the back seat. ‘Which house?’

  ‘Number sixteen.’ Steel pointed. ‘The one with the dog rose and all the heathers.’

  ‘Hmm …’ He sniffed. ‘What kind of car was it again?’

  ‘God’s sake, try and pay attention, Kingy. White Nissan Micra.’ She swung her finger around to point at a rattletrap speckled with dents, parked on the lock-block drive. Orange-brown patches blistered through the paintwork all around the wheel arches. A ‘DON’T BLAME ME, I VOTED SNP!’ sticker on the boot. ‘That one. Now, does anyone have any more stupid questions?’

  Logan checked his watch. ‘Ten past seven.’

  ‘Urgh …’ She slumped. ‘Two hours …’

  ‘At the earliest.’ King gave her a cold smile in the rear-view mirror. ‘Settle in, Sergeant, we’re here for the long haul.’

  And at that, Steel curled forward and thunked her head off the dashboard. ‘Knew I should’ve gone into organised crime instead of the police.’

  Logan thumped her arm. ‘Don’t whinge, we’re all doing it, aren’t we?’

  ‘Urgh!’

  ‘Oh let her sulk.’ King sat back again. ‘I wonder what happened to the rest of the bullion Gaelic Gary and his mates nicked. Two point six million … Course, you’d probably have to deduct the thirty-two grand of heroin they were going to buy machineguns with.’

  ‘If I’d gone into organised crime, I could be breaking someone’s kneecaps right now. Or snorting coke off a stripper’s pert buttocks.’

  Logan stared at Steel. ‘Hello? Professional Standards, remember?’

  ‘Oh, like you’ve never dreamed about it.’

  ‘Certainly not.’ Well, that was at least half true.

  King kept muttering away to himself. ‘Call it another eight grand in sundry expenses …’

  ‘OK, forget the cocaine.’ Steel waggled her eyebrows. ‘Have you ever dreamed about licking cheese spread off Ginger McHotpants’s pert buttocks?’

  ‘No! And stop calling her that.’

  ‘Primula’s good. But no’ the stuff with ham or prawns in it. The wee bits get places you’re no’ supposed to have wee bits.’

  ‘Can you please stop talking now?’

  King chuntered on in the ensuing silence. ‘Even then, that leaves two point one million pounds. Wonder what that’d be in today’s money?’ He got his phone out and fiddled with it.

  ‘OK, so you’re no’ into squeezy cheese. How about Nutella? You could—’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Gah!’ Steel folded her arms. ‘Two hours stuck in a car with Police Scotland’s answer to root-canal surgery.’

  More silence.

  ‘Wow … It’d be worth over eight million today.’ King leaned through from the back again and tapped Logan on the shoulder. ‘And they never found it? Not any of it?’

  ‘Not a penny.’

  ‘Well, if I’m no’ allowed to talk about squeezy cheese, buttocks, or Nutella, why don’t we discuss how much of a waste of my sodding time it is sitting in this car with you pair of bumnuggets?’

  King glowered at her. ‘Detective Sergeant Steel, if you’re not prepared to behave like an adult, why don’t we all just sit here in awkward silence?’

  ‘Suits me.’

  Oh joy.

  Pff …

  So far, the only exciting thing that’d happened was a little old lady taking her Great Dane for a walk. Other than that, sod all for the last – Logan checked his watch – thirty-five minutes? Was that all? It felt like hours. And hours. And hours.

  Steel was slumped in the reclined passenger seat, eyes closed, mouth open, making the occasional snuffling grunt.

  King loosened his tie and sighed.

  Thirty-five minutes.

  Logan turned and stuck a hand between the front seats at King. ‘Lend us your jacket, Frank: I’m going to check on our backup.’

  There was a pause, then King shrugged, picked up his jacket and passed it forward.

  Steel didn’t even open her eyes as Logan climbed out into the evening warmth: ‘Get me some fizzy juice while you’re out. And crisps. And some sort of dirty magazine!’

  No chance.

  Logan clunked the door shut.

  A lone buzzard screamed out its cry overhead, circling in the rich blue of the sky.

  He pulled King’s jacket on, hiding the Police-Scotland-issue black T-shirt with its epaulettes and inspector’s pips. Not the greatest of disguises – a bit baggy and long in the sleeves, to be honest – but it would do.

  Not walking too fast, or too slow, as if he was just an ordinary member of the public, out for a stroll in an ill-fitting borrowed suit jacket.

  He took a left at the end of the street, onto another road lined with bungalow clones in shades of brown and grey. Not rundown yet, but heading that way.

  A Yorkshire terrier scampered past, going in the other direction, chased by a young boy with his hair in pigtails, an X-Men T-shirt, and a cape that looked as if it’d been improvised from a bath towel.

  Odds on, Tufty dressed like that most weekends.

  A right at the junction with the main road and there was the patrol car Ellon had lent them. A pair of uniforms were relaxing in the front seats, stabproofs off and piled up in the back with their equipment belts, windows rolled down, one scoofing from a tin of Irn-Bru, the other eating a chocolate bar.

  Nice for some.

  Logan knocked on the car’s roof, then peered in through the passenger window. ‘You lot Sergeant Winston’s?’

  The guy in the driving seat lowered his Fruit & Nut. ‘Oh aye. Inspector McRae? I seen youse in the papers.’ A toothy smile. ‘Fit like the day?’

  ‘Not meaning to be funny or anything, but if our boy’s not home already, do you think he’s going to toddle past you pair without noticing? In your big shiny patrol car? With the big lights on the roof? And the word “Police” down the side in big shiny letters?’

  Pink rushed up PC Fruit & Nut’s cheeks. ‘Ah …’

  His partner in the passenger seat shook her head. ‘Told you.’

  ‘Sorry, Inspector.’

  She waggled her can at him. ‘“Shut up and drink your Irn-Bru.” Remember that?’

  ‘Shut up!’ PC Fruit & Nut leaned across from the driver’s seat and grimaced up at Logan. ‘We’ll go park somewhere a wee bittie less oot in the open.’

  ‘You do tha
t. Thanks.’ He patted the patrol car’s roof, then turned and walked back the way he’d come as they pulled away.

  Pair of Muppets.

  The rich smoky scent of a distant barbecue wafted in through the open window, curling its way around Logan’s nose, making his stomach growl as he reclined his seat a bit and put his peaked cap over his face. Replacing the scent of burning sausages with the musty-hair smell of the inside of his hat.

  No one ever washed police hats, did they? Not as if you could chuck one in the washing machine, was it? Or could you? Have to check the instructions.

  He stretched out his legs and crossed his arms, vampire-style across his chest.

  Comfortable and warm.

  Could go a snooze right now.

  Well, he could if King and Steel weren’t still nipping at each other like a pair of yappy dogs:

  ‘That’s no’ what I said, I said, “These Alt-Nat nutjobs need castrating.” No’ the same thing.’

  A contemptuous snort from King. ‘You Unionistas are all the same.’

  ‘Hoy! I voted “Yes”, thank you very much! Unionista, my sharny arse!’

  ‘Then why are you so anti-independence?’

  ‘I’m no’ anti-independence, I’m anti-people-being-dicks-about-it. I’m anti-harassment. Anti-burning-people’s-houses-down. Anti-blowing-stuff-up. Anti-hating-people-just-because-they’re-English!’

  Pause.

  ‘Oh. That’s OK then.’ King poked Logan in the shoulder. ‘What about you?’

  Logan stayed where he was. ‘No politics in the car. No religion either. Go back to playing I-spy.’

  Something that sounded suspiciously like … rummaging came from the passenger seat. No way Logan was taking the hat off his face to see what she was up to, though. Seen quite enough of her bra-fiddling to last three lifetimes, thank you very much.

  King sighed in the back, the pik, pik, pik, of his mobile phone marking time with him sending a text or something.

  ‘Girls Just Want to Have Fun’ bounced into the car, getting louder and louder, then it fell silent, replaced by Steel’s gravelly tones: ‘Who dares disturb my rummaging? … Uh-huh … Uh-huh.’ Sniff. ‘And why didn’t you phone him instead of me? … Oh, I see … No, you’re a coward … Yeah, I suppose he is a bit Nosferatuy. You’re still a coward, though.’