Cold granite lm-1

by Stuart MacBride

  'Sorry,' Logan mumbled, letting the youth slouch past and collapse into a chair.

  'Gnnnnnnnn, my head,' said the newcomer, burying the offending article in his hands and letting it sink to the tabletop.

  Watson looked over her shoulder and saw Logan standing there, all done up in his work suit. 'Sit yourself down,' she told him, grabbing a couple of slices of white bread from a new loaf and slapping about half a pack of fried bacon between them. She thumped it down on the tabletop, and chucked more bacon into the pan.

  'Er…thanks,' said Logan.

  The hungover young man sitting on the other side of the table looked vaguely familiar. Was it one of the search team? The one who spilled lager over that bearded bloke from CID? Watson slammed another bacon buttie onto the table, this time in front of the groaning PC.

  'You didn't have to make breakfast,' said Logan, smiling at Watson as she tipped the last of the smoked streaky into the frying pan. A big cloud of hissing steam rose from the pan and she waved it away with the fish slice, little droplets of fat falling from the plastic utensil to splatter on the work surface.

  'What, you'd rather he did it?' she asked, pointing at the PC. He didn't look as if he'd make it as far as the toilet if the bacon buttie decided to give him any trouble. 'Don't know about you, but I like my breakfast chunk free.'

  Another face Logan only partially recognized appeared around the kitchen door. 'God, Steve,' it said, 'look at the state of ye! If Insch catches you like that he'll have a fit…' He stopped when he saw Logan sitting there in his nice clean suit. 'Mornin', sir. Good party last night. Thanks for putting us up.'

  'Er…Don't mention it.' Party?

  The face smiled. 'Ooooooh! Nice legs, Jackie! God, bacon butties. Any chance-'

  'Bugger all,' said Watson, grabbing another two slices of white and stuffing them with the last of the bacon. 'MacNeil only got four packs and they're all gone. Anyway, I gotta get ready.' She grabbed the tomato sauce off the counter top and squeezed an indecent amount of thick red into the buttie. 'You should have got out your pit earlier.'

  The new face creased up with unconcealed envy as WPC Jackie Watson ripped a huge bite out of her buttie. She chewed away contentedly with a large tomato sauce smile plastered across her face.

  Not one to give up easily, the man Logan still couldn't place sat himself down on the last remaining chair and lent his elbows on the tabletop. 'God, Steve,' he said, his voice dripping with concern, 'you really look rough. Are you sure you're OK to eat that?' He pointed at the bacon buttie sitting on the tabletop. 'It looks really, really greasy.'

  Watson's mouth was full of food, but she still managed to mumble round the edges, 'Don't you listen to him, Steve. Do you the world of good that will.'

  'Yeah,' said the PC with no name. 'You get that down you, Steve. Nice hunks of sliced dead pig. Fried in its own grease. Dripping with fat. Just the thing you need to settle a queasy, heaving stomach.'

  Steve was starting to go grey.

  'Nothing like a bit of lard to settle the old…'

  The newcomer didn't have to go any further. Steve lurched up from the table, slapped a hand over his mouth and sprinted for the toilet. As the sounds of retching and splattering echoed out of the bathroom the newcomer grinned, snatched up Steve's forgotten buttie and rammed it into his gob. 'God that's good!' he declared, grease running down his chin.

  'You're an utter and complete bastard, Simon Rennie!'

  The bastard Simon Rennie winked at WPC Jackie Watson. 'Survival of the fittest.'

  Logan sat back from the table, chewing on his bacon buttie, trying to remember what the hell happened last night. He couldn't remember any party. Everything was pretty much a blank after the pub. And some of the stuff before that was none too clear either. But apparently he'd had a party and some of the search team had crashed at his place. That made sense. His flat was on Marischal Street: two minutes' walk from Queen Street and Grampian Police Headquarters. But he still couldn't remember anything after they were chucked out of the pub. The PC currently throwing up in his toilet – Steve – had stuck Queen's 'A Kinda Magic' on the jukebox and promptly taken off all his clothes. It couldn't be called a striptease. There was no teasing and too much staggering round like a drunken lunatic.

  The bar staff had kindly asked them to leave.

  Which explained why half of Aberdeen's constabulary were either in his kitchen wolfing bacon, or in his bathroom chucking their guts up. But it didn't shed any light on WPC Jackie Watson and her lovely legs.

  'So,' he said, watching as Watson tore another huge mouthful out of her buttie. 'How come you ended up with cooking duty?' It was a neutral subject. No one would be able to discern the subtext: did we sleep together last night?

  She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and shrugged. 'My turn. If it's your first time on a sleepover you have to make the butties. But it's your flat, so it goes to the next one in line.'

  Logan nodded as if that made perfect sense. It was too early in the morning and he wasn't up to thinking speed yet. He just smiled in a way that he hoped didn't say anything negative about whatever had happened last night.

  'Well,' he stood, dropping his crusts in the bin. 'I've got to go. The briefing's at half-seven, sharp, and I've got some pre-work to do.' Nice and businesslike. No one said anything, or even looked up. 'OK, well, if you can make sure and lock up I'll see you all there…' He stopped, expecting some sort of signal from WPC Watson. Jackie! Not WPC Watson: Jackie. He didn't get one. She was too busy eating. 'Yeah. Right,' he said, backing towards the door. 'See you later.'

  Outside it was still dark. This time of the morning wasn't going to see the sun for another five months at least. The city was starting up as he climbed Marischal Street to the Castlegate. The streetlights were still on, and so were the Christmas lights. The twelve days of Christmas: Aberdeen's favourite, strung all the way from here to the far end of Union Street.

  Logan stopped for a moment, breathing in the cold morning air. The torrential downpour was gone, replaced by a misting drizzle that made the Christmas lights hazy and blurred. Ivory-white light sculpted into lords a-leaping and swans a-swimming against the gunmetal-grey sky. The streets were slowly filling up with cars. The Union Street shop windows offered a riot of Christmas cheer and cheap tat. Above these, grey granite reached up for three or more storeys, the windows dark where offices were yet to open, people yet to wake. The whole scene was washed with amber and sparkling-white from the festive lights. It was almost beautiful. Sometimes the city reminded him why he still lived here.

  He grabbed a pint of orange juice and a couple of butteries at the nearest newsagents before pushing his way through the back door of police headquarters and into the dry. The desk sergeant looked up at him as Logan shook himself on the way to the lifts.

  'Morning, Lazarus.'

  Logan pretended not to hear him. The briefing room smelled of strong coffee, stale beer and hangovers. The turn-out was one hundred percent, which surprised Logan. Even the vomiting, stripping Constable Steve was sitting up at the back, looking decidedly unwell.

  Logan, clutching a stack of photocopied posters of the dead girl, found a seat as close to the front as he could and sat waiting for DI Insch to start things off. The Inspector had asked him to stand up this morning and tell everyone exactly how little they knew about the four-year-old child discovered at the Nigg tip yesterday.

  He looked up from his photocopies to see WPC Watson – Jackie – smiling at him. He smiled back. Now that he'd had a bit of time to work the panic out of his system he was beginning to like the idea. It had been four months since he and Isobel had gone their separate ways. It would be nice to start seeing someone again. Soon as the briefing was over he was going to ask DI Insch to assign him a different bodyguard. Surely no one could complain about him seeing her if they weren't working together.

  He smiled over at WPC Jackie Watson, her lovely legs hidden beneath a pair of regulation black trousers. She smiled back.
All was well with the world.

  Logan suddenly became aware that everyone was smiling at him, not just WPC Jackie Watson.

  'In your own time, Sergeant.'

  He snapped his head around to see DI Insch staring at him. 'Er, yes. Thank you, sir.' He pulled himself out of his seat and over to the desk Insch was sitting on, hoping he didn't look as embarrassed as he felt.

  'Yesterday at four p.m. one Andrea Murray, head of Social Studies at Kincorth Academy, called 999 to report the discovery of a human foot sticking out of a bin-bag at the Nigg tip. The foot belongs to an unidentified four-year-old girl: Caucasian, long blonde hair, blue eyes.' He handed a wad of photocopied sheets to the nearest person and told them to take one and pass it on. Each sheet was the same: a photograph from the morgue, full face, eyes closed, her cheeks lined where the packing tape had been. 'Our killer tried to hack up the body for disposal, but didn't have the stomach to go through with it.'

  There were rumblings of disgust from the men and women filling the briefing room.

  'That means…' Logan had to raise his voice. 'That means this was probably his first time. If he'd killed before it wouldn't have been a problem.'

  Silence settled back in and Insch nodded approvingly.

  Logan handed out a second set of copies. 'This is the statement of Norman Chalmers. We arrested him last night on suspicion of murder after WPC Watson found evidence linking him to the bin-bag the body was dumped in.'

  Someone slapped her on the shoulder and WPC Jackie Watson smiled.

  'However,' continued Logan, 'we have a problem. Forensics found no sign of the girl ever having been in Chalmers's house. If he didn't take her there, where did he take her?

  'I want one team to go through Mr Chalmers's dealings with a fine-tooth comb. Does he rent a garage? Is he housesitting for anyone? Does he have any relatives, recently taken into care, who've left him in charge of the family home? Does he work somewhere he could stash a body without arousing attention?'

  There were nods all round the room.

  'Next team: door-to-door all over Rosemount. Who was she? How did Chalmers get hold of her?' A hand was raised and Logan pointed at its owner. 'Yes?'

  'How come the kid's no been reported missing yet?'

  Logan nodded. 'Good question. A four-year-old girl, missing for at least twenty-four hours, and no one bothers to call the police? That's not right. This,' he said, handing around the last set of photocopied sheets, 'is a list from Social Services of all families on the register in Aberdeen, with a child matching the age and sex of our victim. Team three: this is your job. I want each and every family on this list questioned. Make sure you see the kid. We're not taking anyone's word for anything. OK?'

  Silence.

  'OK. Teams.' Logan set up three four-man teams and sent them off to get started. The rest of the room shifted in their seats, chatting as the 'volunteers' shuffled out.

  'Listen up,' said Insch. He didn't have to raise his voice: as soon as he opened his mouth everyone shut up. 'We've had a sighting of a child matching Richard's description getting into a dark red hatchback. Other witnesses claim to have seen a similar car hanging about the neighbourhood over the last few months. Chances are our pervert was staking out the area.' He stopped to look round the room, making sure he made eye contact with every person there. 'Richard Erskine has now been missing for twenty-two hours. Even if some scumbag hasn't grabbed him, it was pissing down and close to freezing last night. His chances aren't good. That means we have to look harder and faster. We will turn this whole bloody city upside down if we need to, but we will find him.'

  You could almost smell the determination in the room, just under the cloying funk of hungover constables.

  Insch read out the search team rosters and settled back on the desk as they exited the room. As Logan hung back for his instructions he saw the inspector call Steve the Naked Drunkard over, holding him back until everyone else was gone. Then he began to talk in a voice so low Logan couldn't hear a word of it, but he could guess what was being said. The young constable's face started out flushed and swiftly turned a frightened shade of grey.

  'Right,' said Insch at last, nodding his large, bald head at the trembling constable. 'You go wait outside.'

  Steve the Stripper trudged out, head down, looking as if he'd been slapped.

  When the door closed, Insch beckoned Logan over. 'I've got a Noddy job for you this morning,' he said, pulling a family-sized bag of chocolate-covered raisins out of his suit pocket. He fumbled about trying to open it before giving up and using his teeth. 'Bloody glue these things shut…' Insch spat out a corner of plastic and poked a finger into the hole he'd made. 'We've been asked to provide police support for the council's environmental health team.'

  Logan tried not to groan. 'You're kidding me?'

  'Nope. They need to serve notice and the bloke doing it is a nervous wee shite. He's convinced he's going to get murdered if we're not there to hold his hand. The Chief Constable wants us to be accessible. That means we have to be seen to be giving the council all the support it needs.' He pointed the hole in the top of the chocolate raisins in Logan's direction.

  'But, sir,' said Logan, politely refusing – the things looked too much like huge rat droppings for his hungover stomach, 'couldn't uniform do this?'

  Insch nodded and Logan could have sworn he saw an evil glint in the older man's eye. 'Yes indeed. In fact a uniform is going to do this. You're going along to supervise.' He shook a mound of droppings into the palm of his hand and tossed them back. 'That's one of the privileges of rank: you supervise those further down the tree.'

  There was a meaningful pause that completely passed Logan by.

  'Well,' said Insch, shooing him towards the door. 'Off you go.'

  Still wondering what that had been about, Logan left the briefing room. DI Insch sat on the desk, grinning like a maniac. It wouldn't take long before the penny dropped.

  A worried-looking Constable Steve was waiting in the corridor. His face had regained a little bit of its colour and was now an unhealthy reddish-green rather than pale grey; but he still looked dreadful. His eyes were pink with bloodshot veins, his breath reeked of extra strong mints, but it wasn't enough to disguise the alcohol oozing out of his pores.

  'Sir,' he said, giving a sickly, nervous smile. 'I don't think I should drive, sir.' He hung his head. 'Sorry, sir.'

  Logan raised an eyebrow and opened his mouth. Then shut it again. This must be the uniform he was supposed to supervise.

  They were riding the lift down to the ground floor when Constable Steve disintegrated. 'How the hell did he know?' he asked, slumping in the corner with his head in his hands. 'Everything. He knew bloody everything!'

  Logan could feel dread stomping down his spine. 'Everything?' Did the inspector know he'd got pissed and slept with WPC Watson?

  Constable Steve moaned.

  'He knew we'd been thrown out of the pub, he knew all about the getting naked…' he looked up at Logan with pitiful pink eyes: like a vivisectioned rabbit. 'He says I'm lucky he didn't just fire me! Oh God…'

  For a moment it looked as if he was going to burst into tears. Then the lift went: 'ping' and the doors slid open onto the car park where a couple of uniformed officers were wrestling a hairy bloke in jeans and a T-shirt out of the back of a patrol car. The man's T-shirt bore a lovely upside-down Christmas tree of blood. His nose was flattened and smeared.

  'Buncha fuckin' bastards!' He lunged towards Logan, but the PC holding him wasn't about to let go. 'Fuckin' bastards wis askin' fer it!' Some of his teeth were missing too.

  'Sorry, sir,' said the PC, holding him back.

  Logan told him it was OK and led PC Steve away through the car park. They could have gone out through reception, but he didn't want anyone else seeing the pink-eyed constable in his current state. And anyway, the council buildings weren't that far away: a walk in the open air would do Steve the world of good.

  Outside, the drizzle was refreshing a
fter the oppressive heat of police headquarters. They both stood on the ramp that wound from the rear of the building down to the street with their faces to the rain and stayed that way until a car horn made them jump.

  The patrol car flashed its lights. Logan and the hungover PC waved an apology and walked around the side of Force HQ. Outside the Sheriff Court the protesters were already gathering, clutching their banners and placards, desperate for a glimpse of Gerald Cleaver. And an opportunity to string him up from the nearest lamppost.

  The Nervous Wee Shite was waiting for them at the main council buildings, shifting from foot to foot, peering at his watch the whole time as if it was going to run off if left unsupervised for more than thirty seconds at a time. He gave PC Steve a worried look and then extended a hand for Logan to shake. 'Sorry to keep you waiting,' he said, even though he'd been standing there long before they arrived.

  They exchanged introductions, but Logan had forgotten the man's name within thirty seconds of hearing it.

  'Shall we get going?' The forgettable man stopped, fussed with a large leather folder, checked his watch again, and led them off towards a Ford Fiesta that looked in need of the last rites.

  Logan sat in the passenger seat next to Mr Nervous, making PC Steve sit in the back, behind the driver. One: he didn't want the council's environmental health 'Danger Man' getting a good look at the bloody state the constable was in; and two: if PC Steve decided to throw up again, it wouldn't be all over the back of Logan's head.

  All the way across town their driver kept up a running commentary on what a terrible thing it was to work for the council, but how he couldn't escape to another job because he'd lose all his benefits. Logan tuned him out, just popping back up to the surface with the odd 'Sounds terrible,' and 'I know how you feel,' to keep the man happy. Instead he sat looking out of the window at the grey streets drifting slowly past.

  Rush hour was getting to the point at which everyone who should have left for work half an hour ago suddenly realized they were going to be late. Here and there some daft soul sat behind the wheel, cigarette clenched between their teeth, with the window wound down. Letting the smoke out and the drizzle in. Logan watched them with envy.