‘You’re probably right, but there’s nothing we can do about it right now. Leave it all there. We’ll get it photographed and ready for interviews. Let’s carry on.’
On a small shelf in the corner of the kitchen was an unopened cardboard box of tablets, sat next to a battered Land Rover key. Max stood the pack so that the label was facing him. It was fairly full and the label bore the name W. Leitch. Both ends were sealed with sticky labels. ‘Seen these?’ said Max.
‘What?’ Sally said from behind her mask.
‘Risperidone. If my memory serves me well, it’s an anti-psychotic. I remember dealing with someone who had schizophrenia who was on them. This pack hasn’t been opened and the label is dated a week ago. Hold up, there are two packs here; neither have been opened. Looks like Willie had come off his meds.’
‘Oh, Jesus, this is going to be fun to investigate. We need to find out who his keyworker is.’ Sally made a note in her book.
Max moved into the bathroom, which just contained a spotlessly clean toilet and bath. A solitary bar of yellow soap sat in a tray on the edge of the bath and a toothbrush sat in a mug on the sink. All abnormally normal. All clean and, it seemed, ready for inspection.
Then Max saw it. The fly in the ointment.
A straight-edged sword lay in the middle of the bathtub. Its blade was heavily stained with dark, dried blood. A few flakes had dropped off and sat there stark against the bright, white porcelain. The whole thing was less than a metre in length and the handle was made of patterned metal.
‘Sally?’ Max called out, pulling out his phone and taking a snap of the weapon.
Sally and Janie appeared at his shoulder in the tiny space.
‘Jesus. Hardie was killed with an antique sword? What are we dealing with, here?’ Sally said, her eyes wide. They all stood and stared at the wicked-looking weapon. The pitted and worn blade was dull and lifeless, but the dark, dried and flaking blood was indicative of its effectiveness. It had a sweeping knuckle-guard that bore some rust marks, but it was in remarkable condition.
‘A cutlass, actually.’ Janie’s voice pierced the silence.
Sally and Max turned to look at her.
‘A naval cutlass. Short straight blade, rolled metal quillon, probably the 1804 boarding cutlass, I’d say, but I’m no expert,’ Janie said, a little shyly.
‘How the hell do you know that?’ Max said.
‘I did Napoleonic naval battles as part of my history degree. Part of my thesis looked at the weapons of the time. This is a classic example of the boarding cutlass. I’ve seen one before, at the Kelvingrove museum sword room, but not in as good condition. Have you noticed the initials stamped by the hilt?’
Max leaned forward to get a closer look. “T.H.” was stamped in the blade, faded but legible.
‘Bloody hell. You want to take this in?’ Max looked at Sally.
‘No. Leave it. I’ll get Bill to come down and photograph it in situ. That will do for the time being, but I want CSIs to actually recover and document it. I’m not taking any chances, here. I’m struggling to get my head around this. “T.H.”? I’m assuming that we are all now thinking those initials are a little too convenient?’
‘Willie did say about it being ironic that Hardie died by his grandfather’s sword. Jesus, is this really an ancient feud?’ said Max.
‘I don’t know, but we have the biggest gangster in Scotland murdered, in a weird graveyard with a two-hundred-year-old cutlass. The profile is going to be sky high for this, so we need to keep it tight.’
‘Well, I’ll say this. I think I’m a decent judge of character, and one thing I’m sure of is that Tam Hardie Junior will not be satisfied with whatever we can offer.’ Max paused, searching for the right words. ‘He will want blood. Revenge.’
‘It looks like justice won’t be too much of a problem, right? This looks open and shut. If we have Leitch locked up within a few hours of them reporting him missing, the Hardies can’t complain, can they?’ Sally looked calm and resolute.
‘Yeah, about that?’ Max said his voice even and level.
‘Max?’ Sally said, a puzzled look on her face.
‘Two things. When I asked Leitch if he was going to give us any trouble, he said, and I quote, “Our quarrel was with Hardie.” Our, not my.’
‘Well, that’s not conclusive of anything,’ said Sally, her face puzzled, ‘but I’ve a nasty feeling you’ve something to add?’
Max sighed, and smiled weakly. ‘How did Leitch move the stone, get Hardie in it and replace it on his own?’
Realisation dawned on the detective inspector’s face. ‘Leitch had an accomplice.’
11
Corporal Max Craigie paused briefly and pulled the flexible drinking tube from the top of his day-sack. Jamming it in his mouth he took a long drink of the warm, unpleasant-tasting water. The combination of the stinking forty-five-degree sun and the rubber of the water bladder could ruin even the best quality stuff. He still drank deeply. It was either that or go down from dehydration in a flash.
Spitting the tube out he raised his SA80 up and squinted into the optic, surveying the bleak and barren patch of dirt in front of them, leading up to their temporary home at Control Point Salang. He saw nothing more than flies and the skeletal wreck of a destroyed Toyota pick-up.
They hadn’t seen any Taliban for days now. It was just too bloody hot for them to be out ambushing British soldiers. His PRR transmitter-receiver crackled in his ear as he watched the stocky form of “Dippy” scanning the ground in front of them with the Vallon, checking for IEDs that littered this area of Helmand Province. It had been a shit tour, with almost constant mortar attacks on their small base. Thankfully, they only had two more weeks in this godforsaken country, thought Max, as he scanned the points of danger within his arcs of responsibility.
‘Hurry up, Dips. I’m busting for a piss.’ The broad Glaswegian accent of “Bones” the medic crackled in Max’s ear. They were only five hundred metres from the relative sanctuary of the CP, having only left an hour previously to clear the final stretch of road ahead of the resupply vehicles that were imminent. Dippy’s role as lead man was to clear the route for their section as they approached the last few metres. This was always a favourite target of the Taliban. Hit them just as they were getting back to safety. Max almost laughed at the thought. “Safety?” As if anything was safe here.
He had a sudden prickling sensation between his shoulder blades. Something was wrong. Something was different from before when they had passed by this piece of dust. What was it?
Max wracked his brain for the source of the concern as he watched Dippy continuing to sweep with the detector, moving up to a small banked piece of dirt at the side of an abandoned mud compound.
The donkey. Where was the donkey that had been here earlier, secured against the tumbledown wall? Also, it was so still, and it was too silent. He nudged his pressel on his PRR. ‘Switch on, guys, something’s not right.’ As section commander, it was his responsibility to get the guys back safely, and he had learned not to dismiss these feelings, more accurately known as “combat indicators”. Something was wrong.
His depressed the pressel. ‘Dippy, check every inch, mate. It’s not ri—’
The explosion was a deafening, dull “crump” and the dry, desiccated dirt was instantly thrown skywards, enveloping Dippy in an impenetrable fog. Max’s ears rang with the explosion, his face and body blasted with debris.
‘Contact, contact IED strike five hundred metres from CP gate. Man down, man down.’ Max screamed into his PRR. He rushed towards the clearing dust cloud, already reaching for a field dressing from his webbing, his ears now registering Dippy’s sudden, piercing screams.
‘Medic!’ he screamed into the PRR as he dropped to his knees alongside Dippy whose screams were high and yowling, like an injured animal.
Looking down, he saw that both of Dippy’s legs were missing, just below the upper thigh. Not hanging off, not torn. Just gone. Disappeared.
Blood fountained from the femoral arteries staining the desert floor almost black. Max unfurled the dressing and clamped over the wound just as the medic ran up, already reaching for the tourniquets and morphine vials.
‘Dippy, man. Stay with me. Look at me, big man, look at me,’ said Max lying on the ground next to his friend, staring into his eyes. Big, fat tears were carving trails down Dippy’s dusty cheek, his russet hair poking out underneath his Kevlar helmet.
‘It hurts, man. It hurts like hell, Max!’ said Dippy, through clenched teeth, his eyes wide and full of fear. Not fear, terror. Abject, naked terror.
‘I’m dying. I’m dying, I can feel it. I’m dying … not now … not here, man.’ Dippy’s voice dropped lower and he coughed, painfully.
‘Morphine in,’ said the voice of the medic to Max’s left as he reached across and scrawled the letter “M” on Dippy’s forehead with a felt tip. A warning to others that the powerful painkiller had been administered.
The opioid took effect quickly and Dippy began to breathe more easily, his face relaxing visibly, his eyes losing their focus.
Max pressed on the PRR. ‘Barney, you sent the nine-liner yet?’ he said to the signaller, referring to the formatted message to ops requesting medevac.
‘Yes, mate. It’s been received. Help’s on the way, coming from the CP and helo is scrambling from Bastion.’
‘Roger that,’ Max said. ‘Dippy man, look at me. Look at me, pal, stay awake. You’re gonna go home, man, back to the shite-hole you live in, bud. You’re gonna be good, man.’ Dippy opened his eyes, and his pinprick pupils were full of confusion as the medic tried to get a line into his arm to replace the fluids that were still flowing out of him onto the sand.
‘Max …’
‘Dippy?’
‘Max …’ His voice dropped an octave and was only just above a hoarse whisper.
‘Come on, look at me, pal.’
Dippy’s eyes glazed and the faraway look became an empty one. Something changed. A light went out.
*
Max jolted awake with a stifled scream, his heart pounding in his chest, lathered in a cold sweat, panting heavily. He sat up in bed in his small farmhouse, terror clutching his insides in an icy grip.
A cold nose nuzzled against his neck as Nutmeg – his small, scruffy cockapoo – demonstrated her concern for Max’s wellbeing, whining slightly.
‘It’s okay, Nutty. Just a dream, girl,’ said Max, soothingly stroking the dog’s tightly curled blonde ears, his breathing beginning to settle. The dog lay down again, concern in her intelligent eyes, and rested her muzzle on Max’s legs.
Looking at his bedside clock, Max saw that it was 6.20 a.m. He knew from bitter experience that sleep would not return after the dream, and Nutmeg was looking at him with an expectant gaze. She knew what was going to happen. Nutmeg always knew.
Max threw on his running clothes and headed out to the front of the small semi-detached cottage at the end of a half-mile rutted track.
‘Come on, girl,’ he said, setting off down the track at a fast run, the dog jogging by his side, with little or no effort.
Max had discovered during his therapy that PTSD struck people in many different ways, and that for him some things made it better and some things made it worse.
Alcohol made it worse, talking about it didn’t help at all and family arguments made it much worse. Running with his dog made it better.
So, he ran hard, with his dog, for a full hour.
And he felt better. Not all better, just a little better.
12
After his run, Max showered and dressed and made himself coffee and toast and put down a bowl of food for Nutmeg. The morning was warming up nicely, so he took his breakfast and sat at the front of his cottage at the small table. The view, as always, made him feel better. A long, sweeping vista across fields towards the sea. He had moved here six months ago when transferring and positively loved the place. A small single-storey semi-detached farm worker’s cottage outside Culross, a pretty village overlooking the Firth of Forth. It was perfect for Max’s purposes, being equidistant between Glasgow and Edinburgh, close to his offices at Gartcosh and surrounded by sheep and barley fields.
Nutmeg had come with the cottage, the previous owner having been forced to move into sheltered accommodation. The property had been in great demand, all the other interested parties wanting to put in competing sealed bids, but Max had instantly bonded with Nutmeg. Gladys, the elderly owner, had taken the house off the market as soon as Max had agreed to take Nutmeg on, with the understanding that Max would take her for regular visits at the sheltered housing. They visited Gladys most weeks. She was just content to sit with Nutmeg on her lap for half an hour whilst they chatted and Max made the tea.
Nutmeg was a wonderful companion, who simply stayed home when Max went to work. She would just hang around the large garden, sleep on a bed in the shed and, if she needed company, join Max’s neighbours, John and Lynne Fisher and their two dogs, Tess and Murphy. They were a kind couple in their sixties, who looked after a flock of sheep and grew vegetables on the smallholding to the side of their house. It worked perfectly, with Nutmeg being the ideal farm dog, despite never getting the idea of herding sheep. She never strayed, always escorted Max off the premises and was, without fail, there to meet him when he returned.
Max yawned as he looked at his watch, and realised it was almost 9 a.m. He should be making contact to see what, or where, he needed to be. He had eventually got home from Caithness in the early hours of the morning, after dropping Janie at her flat in Edinburgh.
As if on cue, Max’s phone rang in his pocket. Looking at the screen, he saw it was Ross.
‘Morning,’ said Max.
‘Is it morning, you lazy bastard? I thought it was practically lunchtime,’ barked Ross bumptiously.
‘Late one in Caithness, last night. You heard anything from Sally?’
‘Aye. Why I’m calling you. The MIT are all full-on. They’ve the scene at the graveyard, mad boy Leitch at Burnett Road, and his house to look at. They’ve also found his car, so they need a bit of help. They want you to go with their family liaison officer, as you’ve already met the Hardies. It’s his first FLO job since doing the training and they think it could get tricky. Can you and Janie go with him?’
‘Sure. Text me his number and I’ll give him a call. How about Leitch?’
‘Utterly radio-rental, mate. Loop-da-loop. Well known to the Highland mental health team as suffering with schizophrenia and has not been managing his meds well, but something made him flip. He’s been telling everyone in the custody suite, all on camera, that he has fulfilled the family honour by killing Hardie. Mental health crash team went to Inverness to section him last night. They’ve declared him unfit for interview and unfit to be detained at the police station. They’re looking for a secure bed to send him to for treatment, so the inquiry continues, just without him.’ Ross was not known for being politically correct, but he always got to the nub of the issue at hand.
‘No surprises there. Jeez, what a thing, eh?’
‘Aye. I just wonder how this will leave the Hardies? The old man was very much the boss, but word is Tam Junior is even more ruthless than his dearly departed pa. You need to make it clear to him that we have this in hand, and he isn’t to look to take action himself.’
‘I’ll give it a shot, but I’m not sure he’s the type to listen to advice. How about Leitch’s accomplice?’ asked Max.
‘Yeah, Sally’s DCI mentioned that. Apparently, they aren’t convinced. Willie Leitch has maintained that it was just him. He even said, and it was recorded on the custody record, “I admit killing Hardie, on my own and with no help.” Also, the long and rambling madman journal spells it all out. It’s a slam dunk, Max.’
‘That’s bollocks. How the hell did he move the stone on his own?’
‘Well, I have no idea, Detective Sergeant, but as it isn’t our job, I suggest we get on with what we have been asked to d
o, and leave the investigating to the MIT, okay?’
Max sighed, frustration nipping at him. ‘Fair enough. I’ll go and see Hardie and introduce the FLO.’
‘Damn right, man. Then get back here. There’s a fuck-ton of work to do, and I sure as shite ain’t doing it.’ The phone went dead. Max smiled a little. He liked Ross, but he really needed to work on his personal skills.
Max’s phone buzzed in his hand, the number for the FLO flashing up on his screen.
Max ignored it, as a sudden and irresistible urge rose in his chest. He just wanted to hear her voice. He dialled quickly, feeling a small knot of nerves and listened to the dial tone.
‘Hi, it’s Katie. Sorry I’m obviously doing something more interesting right now. Leave a message or call back. Or don’t. Up to you, byeee!’
The cheery, soft voice of his wife, tinged with warm tones of Yorkshire, was at once comforting and distressing. Max’s stomach lurched. God, he missed her. He missed her so much, he thought, picturing her big smile, infectious laugh and sparkling green eyes.
Shaking his head to clear the sudden fog, he dialled the number for the FLO. It was time to go to work.
13
The FLO wasn’t what Max was expecting. Often these officers were fairly young in service, and selected for the ability to be sensitive and understanding. So, the grizzled, middle-aged detective, surrounded by a palpable air of defeat, was a bit of a surprise. He had jumped into the back of their car in a street a couple of minutes away from the Hardie home. The smell of cigarettes and last night’s booze came with him. He was munching from a bag of crisps, crumbs falling out of the bag as he settled into the seat. Max caught the angry look from Janie as she watched in the rear-view mirror.
‘All right?’ he greeted, without even the merest suggestion of enthusiasm.
‘Paul?’ asked Max.
‘Aye, that’s me, Paul Johnstone. I’ve been stiffed with FLO on this shite-show. You’ll be Max, right?’ His voice was deep and thick with phlegm. He coughed, wetly. His accent was a rough and rapid glottal Clydeside.
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