Scottish Rite (Maggie Devereaux Book 1)

by Stephen Penner

  "Would you like to?" Iain gave an eager smile.

  "Sure." Why not?

  "Saturday then? I get off work at two. We could go have a look around. Most of the rides won't be running this time of year, but it's still worth a visit. And maybe afterwards, if you'd like," the smile faded slightly in uncertainty, "we could have a bite to eat?"

  A soft smile played across Maggie's face. This had gone well. She smiled again at Iain, this time broadly, her caramel-colored eyes sparkling.

  "Sounds wonderful."

  * * *

  Maggie was looking forward to the visit to Aberdeen's amusement park. There was just something interesting about an amusement park in the middle of a city, particularly a European city, rather than off on its own reserve with a 200-acre blacktop parking lot. Of course its real draw had been the excuse it had provided Maggie and Iain to spend an afternoon together, walking and talking and getting to know each other better.

  The time between Thursday morning when the plans had been settled and Saturday afternoon when Iain picked Maggie up had not dragged as slowly as Maggie had feared. Indeed she had been surprised to find that the settled plans allowed her to relax and work on her continuing translation. And when she felt the occasional lingering sting of embarrassment at her attempt at the magic, she found some solace in the fact that someone, somewhere—even 1200 years earlier—someone had once believed in the magic.

  Iain had picked her up at three thirty. The trip to and leisurely tour of the amusement park had taken just over an hour and a half. Although absolutely none of the rides were open, a few of the game booths were still open and Iain had wasted almost fifteen minutes and several pounds trying in vain to win Maggie a prize. Just when she was ready to be turned off by this seemingly excessive display of testosterone inspired machismo, Iain had given up with good humor and just the right mix of faux wounded pride and self deprecation.

  By the time they'd finished doing everything there was to do at the park, it was a bit after five and just the right time for an early dinner. Dinner also seemed appropriate since the sun had set shortly after 4:30. November in the North Sea. The only saving grace had been the clear skies which had provided a rain-free walk through the amusement park and now offered a blue-ink canvass speckled with pin-pricks of starlight.

  Dinner was at The Red House, a very nice restaurant on the edge of the Old Campus and one of Iain's favorites, he said. Maggie had been surprised. He seemed like a fish-and-chips kind of guy, but The Red House was more prime rib and steamed vegetables. Actually, prime rib, steamed vegetables and a side salad, with a glass of red wine. Maggie had the Atlantic salmon fillet with red potatoes, a salad, and a glass of white wine. But she made sure to save room for dessert. Iain ordered dessert as well. His own—it was far too soon to be sharing desserts.

  "So after school," Iain had been saying as the waitress brought them their cheesecake and chocolate mousse. "I wasn't really certain what I wanted to do with myself. I worked a few odd jobs in Glasgow, then moved up here to work on an oil platform out off the coast. That was interesting enough, and the pay was excellent. But it's lonely work and not what I wanted to do. I looked for other work, but without a college degree it was hard to find good-paying work that didn't require me to break my back every day."

  Maggie grunted in agreement as delicately as she could as she fed another bite of cheesecake into her mouth. It was really good.

  "Eventually," Iain continued after a swallow of mousse, "I landed at Alex and Lucy's shop. I was sort of a stock boy, handyman, sales clerk, jack of all trades. Alex showed me the inner workings of the shop—you know, the business side of it: inventories, accounts receivable, thing like that. Well, that's when I knew what I wanted to do. But I only had a school diploma. And I didn't have the capital to start my own business."

  He took another bite of mousse. Maggie's brown eyes remained attentively affixed to his face, at least between bites of her own dessert.

  "So Alex offered to help me. He offered to pay for me to go to business college, so long as I was willing to come back and be his store manager. That way he could stop spending such long hours at the shop, and he could justify paying me a good salary. Your uncle Alex is a good man. Takes care of his own, he does. He'd do anything to help out someone he cares for."

  Maggie smiled at this. He certainly had been generous and hospitable with her. Then, suddenly, a flash of angst burned through her stomach at some ignored memory. But it left as soon as it came and Maggie decided not to pursue it. She was enjoying herself too much just then.

  "I spent two years at business college, earned my business degree. That's the same as a B.A. in the States."

  Maggie couldn't help but roll her eyes at this, but she tried to keep her smile. It always irritated her when Europeans asserted that two years of their college was equal to four at an American institution. She'd been to both now and didn't find American college to be particularly easier than its European counterparts. In the event, however, she let the assertion pass without comment as she scooped up another bite of cheesecake. There would be time enough later to engage that argument.

  "And when I finished up," Iain continued, his mousse almost gone, "true to his word, Alex hired me as the store manager. That was just over two years ago."

  Maggie glanced upward as she did the calculations in her head.

  "So let's see. You're how old now? Twenty—?"

  "Five," he answered, mouth half full with the last bite of mousse. "I just turned twenty five this last September."

  Maggie nodded thoughtfully. A younger man. I like that.

  "I won't ask how old you are," Iain laughed.

  Maggie smiled and raised her wine glass to her lips. "Good."

  * * *

  After Iain settled the check—he's asked her out after all—the two of them stepped out into the cold November evening. The sky was still clear but the growing breeze threatened to bring clouds soon enough, and with them rain. For the time being however, Maggie and Iain could enjoy an after dinner stroll beneath the stars.

  "All we're missing," Maggie said, looking up at the sky as Iain put his coat over her shoulders, "is a full moon."

  Iain laughed lightly as they turned from University Road onto High Street. "Aye, well we've a bit of a wait for that. It'll be two weeks still. It's a new moon tonight."

  "New moon?" Maggie was intelligent and educated, but astronomy had never really interested her. She'd heard the term before, of course, but that was all.

  "Aye, the moon," Iain explained, "has four phases. It starts as a new moon, when there's no sunlight reflected at all, then as more sunlight is reflected it grows from a crescent to a half moon, waxing—which means its getting bigger. Then it grows to the full moon. Then back down to a half moon, waning, and then a crescent again before it's another new moon. Then it starts over. Takes about four weeks."

  Then he added, "In fact, a lot of a calendars mark the moon phases, an open circle for the full moon and a black circle for the new moon. I suppose if you knew your moon cycle well enough, you could look at the moon and practically know the date."

  "Well, that is interesting," Maggie admitted. "I never really knew all that. But why is it called a 'new' moon?"

  "Hmm," Iain considered the question. He wasn't really more than an amateur stargazer himself. "I imagine it seems like it resets itself. Maybe they thought it took the night off to recharge."

  Maggie laughed. "Doubtful," she opined. "So you can't see it all?"

  "No, it's not even up there." Iain looked up at the sky. "It's on the other side of the planet right now."

  By then they had reached the magnificent King's Tower, complete with stone imperial crown, and doubly impressive at night with flood lights shooting up its sides.

  "But," Iain grabbed Maggie's arms gently to stop her gait. They stepped off the sidewalk to allow any other pedestrians to pass, then Iain leaned his head over her shoulder and pointed up at the dark sky. "That just makes it easier to
see the stars."

  She could feel Iain next to her, his cheek against hers, his chest brushing against her back. His proximity distracted her from her efforts to see the moon. Trying to regain herself, she continued the conversation.

  She could feel Iain next to her, his cheek against hers, his chest brushing against her back. His proximity distracted her from her efforts to see the stars. Trying to regain herself, she continued the conversation.

  "You know, speaking of astronomy, I went to Clava Cairns last weekend and—"

  Her thought was interrupted by the piercing scream of a woman on the other side of the King's Tower.

  Maggie and Iain looked at each other, then at the few other nearby pedestrians, all of whom returned each other's gazes, as if to ask, 'Did you hear that too?'

  In answer, a second, longer scream split the air and before its echo had died away, Iain was already sprinting around the far corner of the Tower. Maggie followed after him as quickly as she could, displaying both courage in seeking out the source of the scream and cowardice in not wanting to be left alone.

  As she raced after Iain's retreating form, other passers by running beside her, she knew what all of them were thinking: 'Oh, no. Not another one.'

  Maggie almost knocked Iain over as she pulled up behind him and slammed into his back. He had been the first from High Street to arrive at the scene, but he was not alone. Standing next to him was the source of the screams, a pair of young women whose eyes were streaming with tears and who must have been cutting through campus when they had stumbled across the grisly discovery which lay at their feet. Maggie stepped around Iain's large form and looked down at the blood soaked figure lying prone on the stone path before them. Before she knew it, she had turned her face into Iain's chest, a scream of horror having escaped her lips only to be followed by sobs of disbelief.

  She had only glimpsed the carnage for a moment, but even as her chest expelled uncontrollable sobs into Iain's starched shirt, her brain held the vivid snapshot of the horrible scene relentlessly before her mind's eye.

  The corpse was a woman. Her stomach had been cut open and left an empty, bloody husk. Fresh red blood pooled around the body and was soaking into the long banana-yellow hair of a woman Maggie might have called a friend, if only she'd had more time to get to know her better. But there was no more time.

  Kelly Anderson was dead.

  She lay murdered at Maggie's feet. And surrounding her body was a precisely placed ring of bloody dismembered organs—just like the standing stones which encircled the cairns near Inverness. And placed sickeningly on her forehead was a flat two inch wide stone—just like the small stones that centuries ago had covered the dead at Clava.

  Eventually, the sobs subsided and Maggie took a deep breath. She wiped her nose on the sleeve of Iain's jacket and turned away from the emptied corpse. But she couldn't forget what she had seen.

  And she found no solace in the fact that someone, somewhere—even 1200 years later—someone still believed in the magic.

  26. Clues

  "Too late. Too bloody late."

  Sgt. Warwick stared down at the butchered carcass of victim number three, even as the popping flashbulbs of the police cameras lit the body in a morbid strobe. Warwick was trying hard to focus on the job at hand—collecting clues to the identity of the killer so they could stop him from claiming yet another victim—but all she could think of was how little progress she had made in the four weeks since the FitzSimmons woman's death. And how utterly she had failed in preventing this murder.

  "Doesn't get any prettier, does it?" Inspector Cameron stepped up to her, his pipe bowl glowing slightly in the dark of the cold Scottish night.

  "No, sir."

  "Nor any more helpful." He leaned forward, puffing thoughtfully on his pipe. "Blood everywhere but forensics says still no usable prints—finger, palm or foot. Nothing. Just like the other two." He paused. "Still, it does look different somehow."

  "It's the organs," Warwick frowned. "They're rotating."

  "Are they?" Cameron squinted critically, his eyes tracing the circle of organs around the dead woman's body.

  "Look at the heart-lung combination." Warwick pointed downward. "It was at the Graham woman's head, then at the second victim's side. Now it's at this one's feet. The other organs have followed suit."

  Cameron smacked at his pipe. "Clear m.o. Well, that would seem to dispel any lingering doubts that it's the same killer."

  "Or that he's not done yet," Warwick added through gritted teeth. "They're rotating a quarter turn each time. He's got one more quarter turn left."

  "Or two," Cameron pointed to the bloody pile of intestines which occupied the space above the woman's head. "If he means to complete the circle."

  Warwick sighed. "Or two," she had to agree.

  The inspector looked again at the scene. "I'm still not clear on what the significance of those damned organs is, but the rotating is definitely something to consider. I wonder what else we've got." He smacked at his pipe again. "Richards!"

  Over stepped a rather tall and extremely thin blond woman who bore the embroidered patch of the forensics division on her jacket sleeve. "Yes, sir?"

  "Anything to report yet?"

  "Not really, sir," Officer Richards replied. "We're just making initial observations. Wouldn't want to jump to any conclusions yet." She paused. "Although..."

  Cameron raised an eyebrow. "Yes?"

  "Well, I'm no expert," the forensics officer claimed. "Dr. Wood will be able to say for sure. But it looks to me that this one was a little messier. Just a bit."

  Warwick looked down at the bloody carnage at her feet, so clearly reminiscent of the equally gory scenes of the weeks before. "Messier?" her voice held a hint of disbelief. "How exactly? The others were rather bloody as well."

  "Sorry," the woman offered. "I didn't mean the scene. I meant the cuts. We've had a chance to do a prelim inspection of the organs. They look to have been cut out the same way, but there's noticeably more trauma at the point of incision. The cuts are messier."

  Cameron raised his other eyebrow, this time at Warwick. "What does that mean then?"

  "Well, it could mean several things," Richards began. "Basically, it indicates some difficulty in executing the cut. It could mean a weaker hand, but everything else points rather clearly to it being the same killer. He may have suffered some injury which weakened his arm or hand. Or he may have switched to a different knife. Most likely, though, it's just that the blade's getting duller as he continues to use it."

  Cameron sucked on his pipe stem. Warwick looked down at the body again.

  "Thank you, Richards," Cameron dismissed her back to her work. Then he turned to Warwick. "Duller blade, eh?"

  "Or weaker hand." She echoed his thoughts, "An injury?"

  "Maybe. Something to consider anyway." He exhaled a puff of smoke into the dark air. "For now, let's see what else we've got. Do we know our victim's identity yet?"

  "Yes. I found her wallet in her backpack." Warwick pointed at the rucksack resting a few feet away. "It was hidden—not very well—behind some bushes a few yards from here."

  "And we know it's her backpack?"

  "The photo ID matches," Warwick assured. "It's hers."

  "So what was her name?"

  "Kelly Marie Anderson."

  "Scottish?"

  "American.

  "Student or tourist?"

  "Both maybe. But definitely a student." Warwick fetched the backpack. "The ID was her university ID card."

  Cameron took along drag on his pipe. "So three female students."

  "Three foreign female students," Warwick added. "Not Scottish anyway. Graham was Canadian. FitzSimmons was from Northern Ireland. This one's American."

  "Hmm." Cameron exhaled more smoke. "Well, it's something to consider," he said for the third time that night. "What else is in that backpack?"

  "I haven't had the chance to look." She handed it to her superior's outstretched hands. "Here
."

  Cameron set the bag on the ground and carefully removed several books and papers from inside. Then he extracted what was obviously the woman's day-planner. He thumbed through the pages looking for some clue. At last he stood up with a groan, and handed the planner to his sergeant.

  "Right then," he announced. "It looks like we'll be needing to have that chat after all."

  27. Intentional Tourist

  Maggie's hand skimmed the titles on the shelf, her finger extended like a divining rod.

  'Aberdeen.'

  'Aberdeen.'

  'Aberdeen and Grampian Highlands.'

  'Speyside Whiskey Trail.'

  'Whiskey Trail.'

  'Whiskey Trail.'

  'Whiskey Trail.'

  Man!

  'Victorian Heritage Trail.'

  'Balmoral Castle.'

  'Castle Trail.'

  Then her finger reached the next volume.

  Aha. Here we go.

  She pulled the book from the shelf and confirmed it contained the information and diagrams she would need. Then she walked to the counter, paid for her purchase and exited the store.

  28. Twenty More Questions

  "September twenty-seventh?" Craig Macintyre wiped the nervous sweat from his brow with the palm of his hand. "But that was two months ago."

  "Fine. What about October twenty-fifth?"

  "I—I don't know," Macintyre replied, looking down at the spartan desk in front of him. "I'd have to check my calendar."

  "Right. Then what about last bloody night?"

  Macintyre looked up, his eyes wide and his brow knitted. "Last night?"

  "Aye, mate!" Lt. Russell's fist slammed down onto the table. "Where were you last night?!'

  Macintyre's flinched at the strike against the table, and his eyes flitted nervously around the small, bare interrogation room. "Actually, I'm not exactly sure—"

  Russell grabbed the table with both thick hands and sent it sliding wildly across the green linoleum.