Sleep like the dead lab-8

by Alex Gray

  See what you can find out from the GP she was registered with, he had suggested. She may not have been fit to work for health reasons. If so, then there might be a trail of benefits paid in her name that they could source. And that would be another bit of the jigsaw that took time to find. He sighed again. Try as they might to make progress in a case as quickly as they could, there were always elements that demanded patience; lab reports, ballistics, pathology results… things that had to wait for their slot in another professional person's busy schedule.

  The DCI stood up and stretched. It was time to go home.

  Maggie had so few days of her holidays left and he suspected she had begun to do some work for school, having given up on the thought of them both enjoying a break away. At least their evenings could be spent together.

  'Sir?' DC Fathy whirled round as the DCI entered the room.

  'Working a bit of overtime, Fathy?'

  'It's the sister, sir,' Fathy shrugged as he glanced back at his computer screen. 'Just can't stop thinking about where she might be, so..

  'So?' Lorimer cocked his head to one side, interested suddenly.

  'Well, I thought if we looked at all the students from last year's intake and next year's new ones to come whose forenames were Marianne, we might find something.'

  'And have you?'

  Fathy shook his head. 'No, sir, but I did wonder..

  'Yes?'

  'Well, what if we called on these women and asked about their backgrounds? Asked to see ID like birth and marriage certificates?'

  Lorimer took a step backwards and laughed. 'Any idea how many man hours that might take? And can you see Superintendent Mitchison agreeing to extra bodies for an action like that?' The DCI frowned suddenly as he uttered Mitchison's name. There was no love lost between the two senior officers but that wasn't something that young Fathy needed to know.

  'No, sir,' Fathy hung his head for a moment and looked so disappointed that Lorimer gave in to his natural impulse, reached out and patted the young man on the shoulder. 'Look, it's not a bad idea and in ideal circumstances we might even go that far. But until we have evidence that Marianne Scott is still in the country we'd be in danger of wasting taxpayers' money' `So that's still to be determined, sir?'

  Lorimer nodded. 'Aye. There's no trace of the woman having worked, paid stamps or anything in the last year so chances are she's somewhere overseas.' His mouth pursed in a sudden thought. 'Or working at some occupation that doesn't require official papers,' he said with a sigh.

  Fathy nodded. He knew what the DCI meant. 'You think the woman might have slipped off our radar because she was involved in criminal activity or maybe was on the game?'

  'She has to have supported herself somehow since her marriage broke up,' Lorimer reasoned. 'And it might even give us a clue as to why that happened.'

  'You mean she could be an addict?' Fathy asked.

  'Who knows?' Lorimer replied tiredly. 'Brother Billy mixed with plenty of them. Wouldn't be the first time a lassie got hooked then had to resort to selling herself to fund her habit.'

  'Do we have anyone looking in that direction, sir? Maybe checking the usual drop-in centres used by local prostitutes?'

  Not as yet,' Lorimer continued, mentally adding that to his tally, wondering if Fathy was about to offer to take on that task.

  'Why not pack up for the night and come back tomorrow with a fresh mind, eh? It's still a lovely evening out there,' Lorimer added, nodding at the pale blue space above the city skyline.

  'Right, sir. And thanks,' Fathy smiled a little uncertainly. There was a momentary pause and Lorimer stopped, waiting for the DC to continue.

  'Good night, then,' the young man said at last. 'See you tomorrow, sir.'

  Lorimer was still frowning as he reached the foot of the stairs.

  Had Fathy something else on his mind?

  But as he reached the car park his thoughts were already heading homewards, all notions of what the newest member of his team had or had not been about to share already forgotten.

  As he turned the car into the driveway, Lorimer slowed down.

  Maggie was on her hands and knees, weeding the flowerbed under the dining room window. She looked up at the sound of the car and the way her face lit up as she caught sight of him made his heart turn over. `Hiya, you,' she said, straightening up and rubbing the small of her back as he stepped out of the car.

  'Mm, hiya yourself. You smell lovely,' he added, sinking his face into her hair as he bent to kiss her cheek.

  'Already showered twice today. This heat! Weather forecast says we're in for thunder before the night's out.' Maggie broke away from him, shading her eyes with her hand as she looked up at a pale sky already flecked with pinkish clouds.

  'Red sky at night…' Lorimer began.

  'Is a load of…'

  'Mrs Lorimer!' He gasped in mock horror.

  'Sorry,' she grinned. 'It's what the kids at school say. Think we can't hear them half the time and the other half they know fine well we can.'

  'Itching to get back are you?'

  Maggie made a face as they entered the house together. Not yet. Wish we could have had a bit of a holiday first,' she mumbled.

  'Sorry about that.' Lorimer sighed. 'Maybe we could take off to Mull for the September weekend, though.'

  The bright smile his wife gave in response was pasted on to cover up her discontent, Lorimer knew. But she wouldn't complain.

  Maggie Lorimer knew that crime didn't take a holiday nor did criminals plan their misdeeds just to thwart her own spells of vacation.

  'Good idea,' she replied. Now come through and fire up that barbecue. I'm starving.'

  'One, two, one, two, up, down… you must be joking!' Rosie muttered, darting a black look at the TV screen where an enthusiastic young lovely in a pink leotard was encouraging viewers of her DVD to bend all the way down to the floor.

  She picked up the remote control and froze the screen, leaving the instructress with her mouth open mid-command.

  'Ooh,' she puffed, her steps becoming faster as she approached the loo. This pregnancy thing. You heard all the other women's moans and didn't believe them really, till it happened to you. Like needing to go all the time. `Ah,' Rosie exhaled a sigh of relief as she sat on the toilet. It was the baby's pressure on her bladder, of course. Any doctor could tell you that. But it had been happening ever since this wee one in here had been no significant size at all.

  As she washed her hands, Rosie thought about her impending leave and what she might do in the days running up to the birth of their child. Solly was not back officially until the end of September when his students began their first term. He was already preparing stuff, of course. In some ways he never stopped, she thought, pulling the light cord and waddling back into the large airy lounge that overlooked Kelvingrove Park. Take this evening, for example. Instead of coming home, he was lecturing on a course for young offenders.

  Rosie shrugged as she sauntered across to the window. Would it do them any good? It depended on their level of willingness to respond, Solly had told her. The pathologist sat on the rocking chair placed at an angle in the bay window so that she looked out on the park and over the Glasgow rooftops towards the west.

  They were so lucky, she reminded herself. Their baby would be brought up by educated parents who were loving and caring. Too many of the inmates of these young offenders institutions came from dire backgrounds of deprivation and crime.

  As she gazed at the sky, Rosie let her mind wander. The colours of the setting sun seemed more vibrant than usual, reds tinged with streaks of purple like bruised flesh; the horizon's pale lemon reminding her of the waxy pallor of a bloodless corpse. She shivered, suddenly wishing it was dark and she could be rid of the images scudding violently across the heavens.

  That was another thing about this state of pregnancy. Her imagination seemed to be working overtime. Hormonal activity making you ultra sensitive, she told herself wryly. Wait till the baby's born, a colle
ague had warned her; your mind becomes like a vegetable. Rosie smiled. Well, she'd be off on maternity leave for a good enough spell to let her brain recover from the shock of the birth.

  The telephone ringing made her turn around. Clutching both arms of the rocking chair and heaving herself up, Rosie wondered who on earth wanted to call on a week night. She was no longer on call at nights, but had somebody forgotten that? 'Maggie!' The pathologist's expression changed from apprehension to delight as she heard her friend's voice on the other end of the line.

  'We're having a barbecue out in the garden. D'you fancy coming over?' Maggie asked.

  Rosie made a face, glad that the policeman's wife couldn't see her. 'Sorry, His Nibs is out and I feel too fat and squashy to be bothered driving over on my own tonight. Do you mind?' She felt a sudden pang of guilt. Maggie had never managed to carry a baby to term, had never known what it felt like to have a burgeoning bump cavorting inside her. `Och, that's okay. Maybe you can make it over at the weekend.

  If you feel okay?'

  'Yes, I'm sure we can do something. Just a bit hot and bothered tonight. They said on the evening news that it was to be thunderstorms later on.'

  'Right, well we better get on with it before we're rained off,' she heard Maggie reply.

  Rosie put down the telephone then looked back out towards the west. The streaks of cloud were moving a bit faster now, driven by an unseen wind. Lorimer was home with his wife, then. No late nights chasing after murderous gunmen. Gunman, a little voice corrected her. It looked all the more likely from the ballistics report that the three men had been shot by the same weapon. Some kind of automatic pistol. Brogan, the man in whose flat the two drug dealers had been found, was ex-army. Had he killed them? And his former brother-in-law? Rosie sighed. Such matters were not really her business, but it was something that all her colleagues did regularly: speculate on the types of persons responsible for the damage that they saw down in the city mortuary The pathologist rolled her shoulders, feeling a sense of restlessness that made her get up and walk about the room. As she paced back and forwards, past the open door of her husband's study, Rosie noticed a mess of papers strewn upon the floor. Rosie glanced at the curtain blowing inwards. She had opened that window earlier to let in a draught of cool air. Tim,' she sighed, 'better clear that lot up, hadn't I?' Crouching down, she gathered up the loose sheets, not really paying much attention to what they were – lists of students' names, she thought – more intent on collecting them neatly together and placing them back on his desk.

  She gave a quick glance around, searching for the large Caithness glass paperweight that they had been given as a wedding gift.

  There it was, just beside a basket full of journals. Rosie placed it on top then smiled. He'd never know they'd been scattered around now, would he?

  As she wandered back into the lounge Rosie forgot all about the papers. Behind her, the topmost sheet was rippled by the breeze as if it sought a means of escape from the weight of the pale purple glass, the name Marianne flickering back and forth, tossed in the power of the gathering storm.

  When the first drops began, the woman turned towards the window, suddenly awake. Her heart was hammering in her chest, but there was no dream lingering in her thoughts, nothing to make her sweat in such fear. The noise had been enough; a drumming on the window pane like a scattering of pebbles flung by some unseen hand. Marianne shivered, remembering. He had done that often enough, hadn't he? Woken her up to let her know he had found her again.

  But that could not happen any more and this was simply a storm beginning. Marianne turned on her side, tucked the sheet close about her chin and closed her eyes, willing sleep to return.

  Across the city lightning cracked the sky, illuminating the streets below in sudden flashes as if daylight were breaking through the inky darkness. The hit man rolled over in his narrow bed, listening as the rains coursed down the gutters outside his rented room.

  A sudden flash made him open his eyes, the unfamiliar shapes of the furniture giving him a sense of where he was and why he had not yet returned to the place he called home. For a moment he lay still, wondering. The shooting of those two men had complicated things. Why not simply get into the car tomorrow and leave? ()n a night like this it was a tempting prospect to simply cut his losses for once. He rubbed his eyes as if rubbing the idea away. Ten thousand pounds was too much money to forfeit. Besides, he had his reputation to consider and nobody was going to pull a fast one on him, least of all scum like Brogan.

  CHAPTER 17

  Cala Millor was bathed in its usual sunshine, pooling the room with yellow light when William Brogan awoke. He had left the curtains of his hotel room open the previous evening to watch the streaks of lightning fork downwards into the seas. He sat up, screwing his eyes against the dazzle, stretched out his arms then sank back onto the pile of snowy pillows behind his head. `Ah,' he sighed, breathing out as his lips widened in a smile of utter contentment, 'this is the life!'

  He glanced down at his arms, noting with satisfaction the tinge of bronze that had appeared over the past few days. Another week of this and he'd be ready to move on. Marrakesh, first, then maybe further east. See what pickings there were, he thought to himself. He had booked this hotel for an entire fortnight, though he had no intention of paying for it when push came to shove.

  Dear me, no. Waste of good money, Billy grinned to himself. He'd just push off one fine day as though he were going to the beach, then catch a plane out of here and the hotel would be none the wiser. Wasn't as if they'd kept his passport or anything, was it?

  He'd given it over for them to check but now it was secreted in that safe inside the massive wardrobe, just waiting for him to decide on his next move.

  A noise outside the room made him look towards the door.

  Throwing back the covers, he stepped on to the tiled floor, glad of the cool beneath his bare feet. He padded across the room, unlocked the heavy door and peeped out from behind it, careful to hide his naked body from the gaze of any passing chambermaid.

  There, on the floor, was a British newspaper. Giving a quick glance to left and right, Brogan scooped it up and let the door swing shut.

  'Tough luck, pal,' he said, grinning at whoever had been unlucky enough to have had his morning paper delivered to the wrong room. 'Okay, let's see how you're all getting along back home without me,' he chuckled, turning the newspaper over to see what the sports headlines might be. The footie season had begun after a summer of British clubs wrangling for the best players at a price that would keep them on the right side of solvency.

  Brogan skimmed the pages, turning until he came to the one that gave the latest Scottish Premier League results. `Och, no' again!' he moaned, tossing the paper onto the bed as he read the report on his favourite Glasgow team. Anither year chasin' yer tail at the foot of the table,' he told the newspaper in disgust. Then he looked up at the glass doors that separated his room from an extensive balcony: sunshine was flooding the entire area with a brazen light. Suddenly the air-conditioned room felt too close and cramped and Brogan decided it was time to breathe some fresh air. He picked up the white bathrobe that he'd discarded the night before and shoved his arms into it, luxuriating in its soft fluffiness as he tied the belt around his waist. As he caught sight of himself in the bedroom mirror, his mouth turned up at one corner. A tanned face with several days' stubble looked back at him, the eyes narrowing speculatively. 'Aye, no sae bad, son, no sae bad,' he muttered to himself then, grabbing the newspaper, he headed towards the balcony and the beckoning sunlight.

  This time Brogan began reading the newspaper from the front page, glancing briefly at the main news items before turning to other snippets inside.

  It was written in a small column on the left hand side of the fifth page. Later, Brogan wondered how he'd even managed to notice it, the news item was so small. But at that moment it seemed to loom large on the page as if some magic were magnifying the words as he read them.

  Men
found dead in Glasgow flat, he read, not even remotely surprised by the headline.

  Perhaps it was that inner parochialism that dogs so many Glasgow folk, especially those away from home, for, instead of flicking to find some more interesting stories, Brogan read on. It was his city, he told himself. And he'd see what was going on there.

  But, as his eyes scanned the few lines of print, Billy Brogan realised that it wasn't just his city that was at the heart of the story but his flat. He licked his lips nervously as the final sentence glared at him.

  Police would like to speak to the flat's owner, Mr William Brogan, the writer of the article informed him.

  Billy dropped the paper on to the metal table. Now the sunshine seemed too bright, a menacing thing that might trap him in its beams. He picked up the paper again almost against his will to read the article once more. `Gubby and Fraz,' he whispered to himself. `Gubby and Frazl Then he read the article for the third time, still unable to believe what it was telling him. Had it been him at home, and not these two dealers he'd been trying to avoid for weeks, then one of these shots might have found its mark in Billy Brogan's skull. He'd got away just in time, it seemed.

  Traz and Gubby,' he murmured once again. 'Well, youse two willnae be botherin' Billy boy ony mair, will yese?'

  His lower lip jutted out, the mark of a petulant child, giving him an expression that his sister, Marianne, would easily have recognised as a prelude to a strop. If he were to go back… he could show them he'd been here all this time, prove it by the hotel register… they couldn't pin anything on him for Fraz and Gubby, surely?

  Brogan turned away from the balcony to step inside the cool of the room once more. He had a good idea who'd fired that gun.

  More than a good idea. And going back to Glasgow would be too much of a risk right now. He glanced at the newspaper folded in his hand. Lucky he'd seen that. Now he knew the police would be after him, he had to make a move. Checking out of here was definitely the wrong thing to do. They'd only be able to trace his movements. Check flight lists… Brogan paced back and forward, his feet making damp imprints on the tiled floor. Flying out of Palma might not be such a great idea either. Would they have alerted the Spanish police to watch all airports? Brogan felt the sweat trickle down his neck. Could they trace him from that incoming flight roster? Suddenly this island with its swathes of bougainvillea tumbling over stonewashed walls and green crested waves licking the miles of sandy shores was not the safe haven he had imagined.