'Zak, how goes it?' Joe Doherty sounded as amiable as ever; until the young agent told him how it went. 'You been sat there for four hours?'
'Not quite, sir. The chief took a lunch break at one p.m.; his secretary suggested that I do the same. I know, sir,' he admitted, 'it's almost intolerable, but what can I do?'
'You can drop the "almost", son. It's completely fucking intolerable.
You've never had a detail like this before, have you?'
'No, sir.'
'Then blaine me. I should have made sure you got a better welcome.
Is Chief Hall's secretary close to you?'
'Yes, sir. She's sat across the room.'
'Then here's what you do. Don't ring off; just give her your cellphone, and tell her… do not ask her, instruct her… to take it into the chief's room and, mayor or no mayor, to stick it in his fucking ear. You understand?'
'Yes, sir.'
'So go do it.'
He rose from his chair and did what Doherty had told him. The secretary, a frosty brunette who fitted every description of a Vegas showgirl that he had ever read, protested at first, but Brand, knowing that the line was stil live and that his boss could hear him, stuck to his guns.
'Miss,' he said, slowly and with emphasis on every word, 'the Deputy Director of the FBI is on the line and requires to speak with Mr Hall. Do as I say.'
She gave in, took the cellphone from him as she stood, and disappeared into the chief's room, without, he noticed, bothering to knock. He looked at his watch as he waited, watching the second hand as it swept steadily round.
It was just short of completing its second revolution when the door opened, and a man appeared. He was short for a policeman, five eight at most, several inches shorter than Brand, with a spreading waistline, emphasised by a belt which was cinched at least or too tight, from which the hem of his blue short-sleeved shirt was escaping. He held the cel phone in his left hand; the other was stretched out in greeting. 'Hi, I'm Thompson Hall; welcome to North Las Vegas.
'Son, son,' he said, with the forced heartiness ofaTexan governor on the stomp, as the agent accepted his handshake, 'why have you been sitting here in silence for all this time? Goddamn, if you had only said how important this thing is, Rosalie would have broken up my meeting, mayor or no mayor. Come on, come on, let's waste no more time. Rosie, fix us up with coffee and doughnuts.'
He handed back the cellphone then led the way into his office and walked round behind his desk. Brand looked around; there was no sign of any other visitor, but, at the back of the room, he saw what could have been an exit door, and so he gave the chief the benefit of the doubt.
Nevertheless, the last of his diplomacy had evaporated around an hour before, and so, as soon as he was seated he launched into the reason for his visit.
'Sander Garrett…'
'Yes, son. I understand from your boss that the Bureau's got a burr up its ass about this guy. To me this is just a run-of-the-mil homicide, so what's the story?'
'What do you know about the man, chief?' the agent asked.
'Zilch,' the man replied, abruptly. 'I know that this is only North Las Vegas, the poor sister of the big city, but this place is still full of retired geezers come here for the golf, the gambling and the girls. Garrett paid his taxes and didn't get into trouble so we had no dealings with him till he got his head blown off.'
'Mr Garrett may have been retired, chief, but as I understand it he was 122 no newcomer to the area. He was a partner in a law firm on the strip, and still went in there occasionally.'
'Is that so?'
'Yes. We've done some follow-up investigation, through the American Bar Association; he's practised law here since nineteen sixty-eight.'
'Goddamn, you say?'
'Goddamn I do, sir. Can you tell me, how was Mr Garrett kil ed?'
Hal picked up a bound file from his desk and tossed it across to Brand. 'See for yourself.'
The policeman watched with malicious amusement as his earnest young visitor opened the file. What he had given him was a close-up colour shot of Sander Garrett, taken on a mortuary table. He saw Brand look at it, then, in what seemed to be an involuntary reflex action, close his eyes. When he opened them again, he seemed to focus on the man's small moustache and on a gold fil ing on one of his front teeth, as if to help him cope with his revulsion. Where the centre ofGarrett's forehead should have been, there was a dark jagged hole, speckled with white dots, which he knew had to be bone fragments.
'Kinda grabs you, kid, doesn't it?' said the police chief. 'That's what a soft-nosed forty-five bullet will do on the way out, if you put the barrel against the skul. Doesn't leave any room for doubt, you might say.
'Garrett was in his kitchen when he was kil ed, fixing his supper. The way my guys read it the shooter just walked in through the back door, which wasn't locked, pul ed out a cannon and shot him through the back of the skul, spreading his fucking brains all over the malted milk and cookies. Then he got on with robbing the place.' Halfway through his graphic description, Rosalie came into the room with coffee and doughnuts, which she laid on the desk; Hal did not pause, nor did she flinch.
As she left, Brand closed the folder. Hal offered him a doughnut, but he declined. 'Did the back door open directly on to the kitchen?'
'No. It opens into a laundry; then you have the kitchen.'
'Was the front door locked?'
'Hell, I don't know. Why you ask?'
'Because we are not convinced that this was an opportunistic burglary, as you have described it. We believe that it ties in with two other recent kil ings. If that is right, the kil er had the skil to come through the door whether it was locked or not.' Brand tapped the folder. 'Are your forensic reports in here, chief?'
'No, that's just the photograph book. But the guy didn't leave any traces. There were no prints, other than the ones left by Garrett, his cleaning lady, and a forty-year-old blonde called Charlene Stacey Garrett was widowed; Stacey was his lady-friend. We thought about her for a while, but we couldn't tie her to it. She's a sales rep and she was out of town at the time.'
'Who claimed the body?' asked the agent
'She did.'
Brand opened the folder once more; he flicked past the morgue photographs and turned to those taken at the crime scene; several showed Garrett face down across his kitchen table, slumped in the midAe of a lake of blood. 'The guy didn't exactly barge in,' he said, quietlyBt
'How do you work that out?' V
'The victim was shot through the back of the head. If he had heard the door open, he'd have turned around. How about the gunshot itself? Did any neighbours hear anything?'
'Nope. The lab said he used a muffler.'
'Just like your average burglar,' murmured Brand. 'He goes out on a job carrying a silenced forty-five.' If Hal picked up his irony, he said nothing.
'So what was taken from the house?'
'Money, Garrett's watch, credit cards and other valuables.'
The FBI agent spun the folder around and pushed it across the desk.
'See the display cabinet in that photograph?' Hal nodded. 'It's ful of Meissen pottery; collectables, very expensive. Those are valuables, yet they were left.'
'Okay,' the chief grunted irritably, 'but they are also very identifiable.
This wasn't no col ector. It was probably some spic crack-head out to feed his habit.'
'So where did he sell the watch? Where did he use the cards?'
'He ain't done that, so far.'
'Let's hope he does,' said Brand, maintaining his patience. 'Those other valuables: what were they?'
'According to Ms Stacey, he took two items. An Apple laptop computer, plus… wait for this… he took a box of very expensive Cuban cigars.'
31
'Come on, Andy.' There was a chal enge in Mario McGuire's voice. 'Tell us the truth. Are you real y looking forward to Dundee?' The jazz quartet was on a break, and so the question carried to everyone in their alcove, some of them seated
at two tables pulled together, others standing.
As he spoke he glanced around them all: Maggie, Willie Haggerty, Brian Mackie, Dan Pringle, the two other divisional heads. Detective Superintendents Greg Jay and Willie Michaels, Neil Mcllhenney, Sergeant Sammy Pye and his fiancee, Ruth McConnell, and Karen, the outgoing head ofCID's heavily pregnant wife. The Chief Constable had joined them for supper in La Rusticana, but had ducked out diplomatically, to al ow the serious business to begin.
Martin leaned back against the wal of the Cel ar Bar, his pint glass almost disappearing into his big hand. 'You know, Mario,' he said easily, with a grin, 'you always were a cheeky bastard.'
He slipped an arm around Karen's waist. 'As I think about your question, I can only reply with three of my own. First, how have I stood you lot for so long? Second, what the hell's going to happen if there's a serious crime tonight, since the entire CID command structure's in the process of getting rat-arsed? Third…' He spun his fingers and his glass appeared, empty. '… Who's going to fil this up? It's Deuchar's,' he added, 'in case you've forgotten.'
Sammy Pye picked up the mug containing the remains of their kitty, and the note of the round, and headed off to catch the attention of the big, red-headed manager. 'Are you going to give us the serious answer now, Andy?' asked Maggie Rose. 'Or is it too late for that?'
The newest member of the Association of Chief Police Officers looked back at her. 'One more pint and it wil be. One more pint and I'd be too maudlin to say this, or probably I'd do something very embarrassing if I tried.' He started to put his glass to his lips, before remembering that he had drained it. 'I've been in the trenches with you guys… and gals. I include my beautiful wife in that, and young Pye up at the bar there, and you too, Ruthie, since you know where most of the bodies are buried, and of course our absent friend, who, even as I speak, is probably scaring the living shite out of some poor rural polisman in wild Montana. I love every last one of you.' He paused and ran his eyes around the group.
'These have been the best years of my life… so far… and for them, I thank you all. Mind you, I suppose I should extend that vote of thanks to all those vil ains who over the years have been so fucking stupid that they've let the likes of us catch them.'
Up at the bar, Sammy Pye looked over his shoulder, wondering what the laugh was about.
'So,' said Martin, out of his earshot, 'you want the serious answer, Mags? Wel here it is. Through those years, I've had some close calls… the last one closer than most of you know. The truth is, I don't want any more; I've used up al my luck. I couldn't even trust myself to govft on an armed situation any more, because I know that if I did I would pul the trigger at the first hint of a threat.
'I'm looking forward to Dundee because it takes me out of the line of fire. I'm not saying that our job's life and death every day, because we all know that it isn't. But it can be. It has been for me, and for some of you, and we can all remember a couple of col eagues who aren't around any more. It's not getting any less dangerous, either; we'd an armed robbery this afternoon… bril iantly cleared up inside two hours by Superintendent Rose and her team. Round of applause, gentlemen, and thanks, Mags, for letting me sign off without any red marks on the crime figures.'
He raised his empty glass in his colleague's direction, while the others nodded agreement.
'So yeah,' he went on, 'I'l put on my ACC's uniform on Monday without the slightest qualm or pang or any of those things. I'l miss you al, of course; but I'll have the consolation of a new job. I'm going to be responsible, believe it or not, for community policing, traffic patrols and public relations, among other things. And if any of you lot are caught speeding round the Dundee ring road, don't think I'l pul the ticket. Far from it, I'l put on my PR hat and make sure you wind up in the Courier.'
He took his replacement pint ofDeuchar's Ale from the tray that Pye had brought back. 'There is one other thing I should say. As some of you may know also, I have been round the block a couple of times and more in a personal sense. Well, final y, I've found what was meant for me al along. I'm looking forward. God wil ing, to many years of coming home safely at night to Karen, and our daughter, when she's born. I think she deserves that security. I think they both do.'
He took a long swal ow from his glass. 'Right, that's it. Speeches over, let's get on with the business of the night.' The others, rendered silent for the moment by the frankness of his admissions, took their drinks from Pye's tray, as the musicians wandered back to their corner of the bar and picked up their instruments.
They had reached the third bar of 'Stormy Weather' when a mobile phone sounded in the middle of the detectives' alcove. 'Gonnae no dae that!' said Martin, theatrical y, looking round for the culprit, and smiling as an embarrassed Greg Jay took his handset from his pocket. 'Be firm with her, Greg,' he called out.
The Leith CID commander turned his back on the group and held the phone to his ear. The rest could not hear what he was saying, but they saw his body stiffen slightly in his chair, a reaction that killed the smiles and stil ed the laughter. Jay ended the cal then turned back to face the table, his eyes picking out a col eague. 'Mario,' he said. 'Beppe Viareggio's your uncle, yes?'
McGuire nodded.
'In that case, I think we should have a talk outside.'
32
'What do you have for me, Special Agent Kosinski?' asked Joe Doherty.
'I don't have anything new, sir. The forensic specialists still haven't secured a positive result from their sampling.'
'How about our interview with the man who succeeded Mr Grace as senior partner of the Buffalo firm? Have you set that up yet? The link flickered for a second, forcing the deputy director to repeat his question.
'Yes, sir, that is arranged. The man's name is Jackson Wylie; he says he recal s meeting Mr Skinner, at a party at the Grace mansion, in his and Dr Sarah Grace Skinner's honour. Since it's Saturday, he's asked if you'd mind meeting him on board his cabin cruiser in the Bayview Marina; he told me that he always spends Saturdays on the boat doing maintenance tasks. I said okay, sir; I sort of assumed you wouldn't mind, given that Deputy Chief Skinner has met the man.'
'Sure, that's no problem. What time have you set?'
'One o'clock, sharp, sir. Your flight from Montana is due in to Buffalo at eleven forty-five, but I left you a little leeway. Mr Wylie said he'd provide some lunch on board. There wil be a fax for you at the airport showing the route to his mooring.
'I fixed the meeting through Mrs Thorpe, Mr Wylie's personal secretary; she also worked directly for Mr Grace when he was at the law firm. I asked her if she recognised the names Bartholomew Wilkins or Sander Garrett. She didn't, sir, but she has undertaken to check through his personal files… they're still held at the firm's offices… to see if either name comes up, but she wasn't hopeful. She's very efficient, sir; I don't expect results.'
'No; and neither do I, but I'm not beyond the age where I can take pleasure from a surprise, so let's just wait to see what she finds. While she's doing that, Troy, I want you to book yourself on a flight to Chicago on Monday. I want you to interview Mr Arthur Wilkins; he's the son of Bart Wilkins and he succeeded him as senior partner in the family law firm, Wilkins, Schwartz, Wilkins and Fellini.
'I want you to find out what he knows about his father's business and political life and about what he's been doing since he retired.'
'Yes, sir.' Kosinski seemed to hesitate. 'Eh, sir,' he continued, tentatively, 'about the weekend?'
'You done al you can there?' asked Doherty.
'Yes, sir, I believe so.'
'Then go home to New York, son. Just keep your cellphone switched on, so that Special Agent Brand or I, or your area SAIC can reach you.'
'I wil, sir. Thank you, sir.'
The Deputy Director ended the cal, shaking his head. 'These young guys,' he murmured to Skinner. 'I love 'em. They come out of the Academy these days trained as wel as the guys in special forces, and as committed. I worry about my country sometimes,
then I think fifteen years down the road, to a time when the director and I are gone and goodhearted boys like Brand and Kosinski are running the show.'
The big Scot shrugged. 'You may not be too good at running elections… I like the old-fashioned way, where voters put a cross on a piece of paper and they're al counted by real people… but usual y you wind up with the right guys at the top.'
Doherty held up a hand, index finger pointing in the air. 'Ah, but now we live in an age when the outcome can depend in part at least on how funny the candidates are on fucking television chat shows. Now it real y has started to get dangerous. Now if the wrong guys had the power…'
'In that case, my friend, it is al the more important that you and your director get hold of the young guys like Troy and Zak, and the young girls too, and teach them the things they haven't learned at the Academy.
Teach them your values, and teach them that patriotism real y can be the last refuge of the scoundrel.'
'We haven't got all that many years left to do it,' said Doherty, lighting a cigarette.
'Fewer, if you keep doing that.'
The American smiled. 'Christ, you're getting to be a zealot yourself on that subject.'
'No one has so many friends that he can afford to lose a single one to those things.'
'Blah!' Doherty exclaimed, but he dropped his Marlboro, crushed it under his foot and kicked it into the gutter.
Skinner looked back up Bart and RoseAnne Wilkins' driveway. 'So what do we do now?' he asked. 'We're done here, I reckon, and our return flight isn't until half seven tomorrow.'
'Ah hell, we'll see the sights of Helena, eat some prime beef and try to drink the Napa Valley dry. But first, let's see if the other young soldier's getting better treatment in Vegas than he was when we spoke last.' He dial ed Brand's number.
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