Birthdays for the Dead

by Stuart MacBride

  The camera trembled in my hands as I stared at the little screen. ‘Jesus.’

  ‘Ash, you have to see this.’

  A little girl – couldn’t have been more than three or four – naked, lying on top of a double bed, crying. A man wearing nothing but a Homer Simpson mask stood next to the bed, playing with himself. The next picture was worse.

  ‘Ash, Assistant Chief Constable Drummond’s computer is full of child pornography. There has to be thousands of images here, videos too.’

  I switched the camera off. Put it back on the shelf. Pulled out my phone and dialled the station.

  ‘Ash? What are we—’

  I held up a hand. ‘Shh…’

  ‘Assistant Chief Constable Drummond’s office, how can I help you?’

  ‘Nicola, it’s Ash. Ash Henderson. Is he in?’

  Her voice cooled. ‘Officer Henderson, I’m sorry about your daughter, but I don’t think it’s really—’

  ‘I want to apologize for my behaviour yesterday. I… It’s been difficult for us. I wanted to say sorry.’

  A pause. ‘One moment, I’ll see if he’s free.’

  Bland, innocuous hold music, then, ‘I’ve cut you a lot of slack, Detective Constable, given your situation, but this is unacceptable. Steven Wallace claims you broke into his home last night and subjected him to—’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So you’re not denying it? Have you any idea how much trouble—’

  ‘No. I mean I know about you.’

  A pause.

  He put a little metal in his voice. ‘And exactly what do you know?’

  ‘Everything.’

  More silence.

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

  ‘No? Is that a friend of yours in the Homer Simpson mask, or did you put the camera on a timer?’

  Alice raised her eyebrows and mouthed, ‘Homer Simpson?’ at me.

  I waved a hand at her.

  ACC Drummond cleared his throat. ‘I see… And what do you want?’

  ‘Guess.’

  Muffled scrunching noises came from the other end of the phone – Drummond putting his hand over the mouthpiece. ‘Nicola, clear my schedule for the afternoon. I have to go out.’ Then he was back. ‘Neutral territory: Moncuir Woods, the parking area by the sculpture trail. Half four.’ He didn’t wait for confirmation, just hung up.

  ACC Drummond’s blue beamer turned onto the gravel driveway and crunched to a halt in front of the garage. He climbed out and scurried over to the front door.

  I stepped back from the bedroom window.

  The sounds of keys and locks echoed up from below, then the front door slammed shut.

  ‘OK.’ Alice took a deep breath, keeping her voice low. ‘What’s the plan, I mean we do have a plan don’t we, he’s going to—’

  ‘We’ve got a plan…’ I reached into my pocket and pulled out the gun.

  Footsteps on the stairs: Drummond taking them two at a time.

  She stared. ‘Ash, is that… Well, of course it is.’ Alice shrank back against the wardrobe. ‘Is that what happened to your foot, you accidentally shot yourself with your own—’

  ‘I did not shoot myself.’ I blinked. ‘It’s complicated. And it wasn’t this gun.’ I tucked it into my belt, at the side on the left, where my borrowed jacket would cover it. ‘And it wasn’t an accident.’

  ‘You did it on purpose?’

  My gloves squeaked on the door handle. ‘Are you coming or not?’

  Through in the study, ACC Drummond was on his knees in front of the desk, hauling CDs out of a black zip-up case and dumping them into a carrier-bag while the computers powered up.

  I knocked on the doorframe. ‘Problem?’

  He jumped, spun around, eyes and mouth wide. His lips twitched, then he scrambled to his feet. ‘You have no right coming in here! This is private property.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I’m… I’m placing you under arrest.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ He squinted over my shoulder. ‘Dr McDonald? I… I want you to phone the police: Constable Henderson has become a danger to himself and others.’

  The walking stick was a good sturdy model. I jerked it up into the air, caught it by the bottom and swung it like a crowbar, smashing the head into one of Drummond’s pictures. The glass shattered – the ACC and some bloke off the television crashed into the carpet. ‘WHERE IS SHE?’

  He flinched. Opened and closed his mouth a couple of times. Then put on his sergeant major’s voice: ‘Officer Henderson, I insist—’

  Another picture exploded off the wall.

  ‘Where is she, Drummond?’

  Alice squeezed past me into the room. ‘You should really tell him, Assistant Chief Constable, he’s been under a lot of stress recently, and I don’t think Ash is too worried about the consequences of battering your brains out right now.’ She settled into the office chair. ‘Where’s Katie?’

  ‘I don’t know anything about—’

  The cane’s head battered into his cheek, hard enough to make my arm shake. He staggered against a shelf, sending law books thumping to the ground. Stood there with a hand pressed against his face, groaning.

  ‘Where – is – she?’

  ‘I don’t—’

  I went for the side of his knee this time and he yelled, then doubled over – clutching at the joint. So I cracked the lying fuck on the back of the head too. Blood and hair stuck to the handle.

  Drummond screamed and curled into a ball, arms wrapped around his head. ‘I don’t know, I don’t know!’

  Alice shoogled the office chair closer to the desk. ‘It’s my professional opinion that Officer Henderson is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of what’s happened, he’s not responsible for his actions, it’d certainly count as temporary insanity if he beats you to death.’

  ‘I don’t know where your daughter is!’

  I held the gun in front of his face, hauled the slide back and racked a round into the chamber. Then stuck the gun against his forehead. ‘Give me one reason, you sick little shite.’

  ‘You’re crazy, you’ve lost your bloody mind!’

  Alice nodded. ‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I think it was all your child pornography that finally pushed him over the edge.’

  ‘It… It’s evidence in a case, I was only holding it until—’

  The gun made a dull thunk when I slammed it into his head.

  ‘Aaaagh…’ Blood seeped out of the gash in his scalp.

  ‘You made everyone at the station do PNC searches.’

  ‘It’s not my fault!’ He covered his head with his arms again, scarlet soaking into the sleeves of his white shirt. ‘He found out about everything… What was I supposed to do, let him tell the world? It’d ruin my family – my wife, my children, my friends…’

  ‘Who found out?’ I forced Drummond’s head back. Jammed the gun barrel into his cheek. ‘WHO FOUND OUT? WHO DID YOU TELL?’

  ‘It wasn’t—’

  ‘I’LL BLOW YOUR HEAD OFF, YOU PIECE OF SHITE!’

  The words came out high-pitched and fast: ‘A journalist, I give them to a journalist! Every year, three weeks before each girl’s birthday, I have to give him the family’s address.’

  A journalist…

  I let go and limped away. Stared out of the study window at the shining street. The clouds ate the sun, and everything went grey and gloomy again. All this, just so some tabloid scumbag could get at the story. So they could doorstep Lauren Burges’s mother and ask her what it felt like to know her only child’s bones had been dug up in a dilapidated park. Maybe stick a camera in her face: ‘GRIEVING MOTHER CRIES FOR POOR LAUREN – EXCLUSIVE!’

  I leaned on the windowsill. ‘Who was it?’

  ‘I didn’t have any choice, he was investigating the death of a … colleague in Inverness.’ The ACC
coughed. ‘He found out about our little group.’

  ‘Drummond, I swear to God I will put a bullet in you.’

  Alice nodded. ‘Temporary insanity.’

  ‘He’s…’ Deep breath. ‘He’s called Frank McKenzie; he’s a freelance journalist.’

  ‘No he isn’t, he’s a fucking photographer on the Castle News and Post…’ I frowned down at the front garden.

  Outside Megan Taylor’s house – when Jennifer and her cameraman were waiting to ambush me – Shifty Dave taking the piss: ‘If it’s no’ Wee Hairy Frank McKenzie. Two counts drink driving, and six months for phone hacking. Surprised any paper’ll touch you since you got kicked off the News of the World. Relegated to camera boy now, are we?’

  Got kicked off a London-based paper. London: the only place other than Oldcastle where the Birthday Boy had taken more than one victim. Frank McKenzie: always there whenever we turned around. Every time there was a press conference, or an appeal from the parents, there he was with his camera, recording it all. Preserving it. Soaking up the grief.

  I thrust the gun into Alice’s hands and lurched for the door. ‘If the bastard moves, shoot him.’

  Down the stairs – my right heel thunking into every step – then out the front door, hirpling along, the cane thumping against the wet tarmac.

  Shadows lengthened across the street, everything painted copper and gold. I unlocked the Renault and hauled the driver’s door open. It was in here somewhere… Not in the door-pocket. I knelt on the damp pavement and peered under the seat.

  There it was – lying next to two empty water bottles, some scrunched-up receipts, an empty crisp packet, and the discarded syringe.

  I reached in and plucked the SD card from the debris, blew the dust off it, and hobbled back to the house.

  Alice slipped the SD card into the slot on Drummond’s laptop. ‘What are we looking for?’

  ‘You’re the psychologist, figure it out.’

  She fiddled with the mouse for a bit, and a window appeared, full of thumbnail images. Alice scrolled through them: half a dozen pics of a grinning ginger kid holding an oversized cardboard cheque; another half-dozen of a car on Dundas Road with the front end caved in and a smear of what might have been blood on the dashboard; a series of random faces grinning at the camera; thirty or forty shots of the press conference in Dundee – DCS Dickie sitting up on the platform with Helen McMillan’s mum; a few arty shots of the Oldcastle skyline; and that was it.

  I breathed out. Nothing there.

  Alice opened up a web browser and started clicking away at things.

  ‘What are…’ Drummond cleared his throat. ‘I have money.’

  I turned on him. ‘You want to buy your way out of it? Flash a few grand and we’ll forget all about your collection of kiddy porn? Seriously?’

  ‘I can… You want to be a DI again? I can make that happen. DCI even.’

  ‘Ash?’

  ‘I’m going to throw your arse to the wolves, Drummond.’

  ‘Come on, be reasonable.’

  ‘Ash!’

  I grabbed the gun and ground it into his forehead. ‘You want reasonable?’

  Alice tugged at my sleeve. ‘Ash, you need to look at this.’

  She pointed at the laptop screen. A girl I didn’t recognize was tied to a chair in a filthy basement room, her bare skin covered in bruises, head shaved, three gouges across her chest leaking scarlet onto her pale skin. The next image was the same again, only worse. In the one after that, her throat hung open and dark.

  Alice double-clicked on the first image, filling the screen with it. ‘I downloaded a program to find deleted files on the card…’

  Little bastard. Little fucking bastard. I turned, stared down at Drummond, snivelling away on the study floor. ‘You piece of shite.’

  ‘I… I didn’t…’

  ‘Ash, I know her: she’s one of the missing girls the Party Crashers are looking for.’

  ‘You gave him their addresses!’

  ‘It… McKenzie was… Blackmail. I didn’t have any choice! I didn’t know!’

  ‘YOU HELPED THE FUCKING BIRTHDAY BOY!’ I grabbed Drummond by the hair again, banged his head against the desk. ‘Open your mouth.’ He stared up at me, eyes wide and full of tears. ‘OPEN YOUR MOUTH!’

  He did. I jammed the gun barrel inside.

  ‘Gllllk…’ Hands up, palms facing out, whole body trembling.

  ‘We could’ve caught him. We could’ve caught the bastard years ago! HE’S GOT MY DAUGHTER!’

  Chapter 47

  ‘One second, I’ll check for you.’ Hold music warbled out of my phone.

  The back end of Drummond’s BMW crept into his garage, reversing light glowing. I held up a hand and the car rocked to a halt.

  Alice clambered out from behind the wheel and popped the boot lid. ‘Anything?’

  ‘They’re looking.’

  ‘Hello, Assistant Chief Constable? Yes, Mr McKenzie isn’t in today, he’s putting his mother’s house in storage – poor dear has to go into a home. Dementia. I can take a message if you like?’

  I didn’t. I called Rhona instead and asked her to do a PNC check on Frank McKenzie and his parents.

  ‘Is… Is everything OK, Guv? Only… Well, you didn’t come home last night and I made curry and—’

  ‘Please, Rhona. I need those details soon as you can.’

  ‘Oh… OK.’

  ‘Call me back.’ I hung up, stuck the phone in my pocket. ‘You ready, Alice?’

  A nod.

  Together we heaved ACC Drummond into the boot of his BMW: arms cuffed behind his back, face a mass of bruises and seeping red cuts. A knotted shirt acting as a gag. Alice dumped the laptop and tower unit in beside him, then went back through the door to the house for the CDs.

  I reached in and slapped the filthy little bastard.

  He blinked up at me with puffy, bloodshot eyes.

  ‘Listen up, Drummond – if anything happens to Katie, I’m parking this car in the middle of Moncuir Woods and setting fire to it. With you in the boot.’ The lid made a satisfying clunk when I slammed it shut.

  And then Rhona phoned back. She read me Frank McKenzie’s criminal record – it was pretty much identical to the version Shifty Dave had reeled off outside Megan Taylor’s house the other night – then gave me an address in Cowskillin.

  ‘What about the mother?’

  ‘Couple of complaints from the neighbours a few years ago: playing loud music in the wee small hours, standing in the back garden in her nightie screaming at the seagulls, that kind of thing. You want the address?’

  Christ’s sake… ‘Please.’

  ‘Mrs Dorothy McKenzie, thirty-two McDermid Avenue, OC15 3JQ.’

  I waved Alice towards the car. ‘Rhona, I owe you a big one.’

  ‘What’s this all about, Guv? Do—’

  I hung up and clambered into the passenger side of Drummond’s BMW, jammed the walking stick into the footwell. ‘Drive.’

  The clouds were fringed with violent pink and orange as the light faded. Twenty past four on a Monday afternoon and McDermid Avenue was virtually empty. No sign of a removal lorry.

  I climbed out, stuck the gun in my waistband, and hobbled across the road. Alice scurried along behind me. Number thirty-two looked like all the other buildings on the sandstone terrace – three storeys high, bay window on one side of the panelled door.

  No wonder the little bastard was always lurking about when we were here.

  I leaned on the bell, but nothing happened – it was dead. So I pounded on the door instead. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.

  The room with the bay window was stripped bare, nothing left but dusty rectangles where pictures once hung.

  Alice stood so close she was pressed against me. ‘Shouldn’t we call Dickie and the team? I mean we know it’s him, we should get a SWAT team down here or something…’

  ‘You any idea how long it’ll take to
get a firearms team authorized and organized?’ I hammered on the door again. ‘He’s been in there all day, with Katie…’

  BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.

  ‘Well, I could phone anyway and they can back us up and—’

  The door opened a crack and a single eye peered out. Frank McKenzie, face shiny with sweat, breathless as if he’d been running. ‘Go away. Go away, or I’ll call the police.’

  ‘Open the door.’

  ‘I’ve got nothing to say to you. This is harassment.’

  ‘OK, OK.’ I held my hand up, backed away a step… And lunged. My shoulder slammed into the wood and the door crashed open. I couldn’t stop: my right foot wouldn’t take my weight, bloody thing gave way and I thumped full-length on the hall carpet, sending up a cloud of dust. It was empty – like the front room – the only light coming from the open front door, making everything dark and grey.

  McKenzie was flat on his back, hairy arms covering his head, legs flailing.

  I hauled myself up. ‘It wasn’t Mrs Kerrigan, was it? You wrecked my house looking for this…’

  He stared at the SD card in my hand. ‘It… I…’ Scrambled to his feet. And he was off, running down the hall.

  I limped after him, the cane thumping against the dusty carpet, the gun cold and heavy in my hand.

  Alice barged past, going at full tilt, black hair streaming out behind her, red Hi-tops flashing in the gloom. ‘Come back here!’

  McKenzie battered through the door at the end of the hall – a glimpse of an old-fashioned kitchen – and then out the back into the garden with Alice closing the gap.

  Halfway down the hall I froze…

  Muffled screams came from behind one of the doors.

  Katie.

  It opened on a windowless corridor, the bare floorboards disappearing into darkness. A cord, hung from the ceiling – I pulled it and an overhead strip-light blinked and flickered into life. The corridor took a right turn about four or five feet in, heading towards the back of the house. I limped up to the corner: another short length of corridor with a door at the far end.

  Locked.

  More screaming.

  I braced myself against the wall, taking as much weight as I could on the walking stick, and kicked out with my left. Twice. Three times. On the fourth go the lock ripped its way free of the surround, and the door jerked open. The stench of rancid meat slithered out into the corridor.