Cold granite lm-1

by Stuart MacBride

  The main attraction was still hidden.

  He pulled the zip all the way down, exposing a naked body that had been past its prime even when it was alive. According to Lothian and Borders Police, Geordie had been a keep-fit fanatic in his younger days. Someone who took a lot of pride in his appearance. The man on the slab had a beer belly, his thick forearms and shoulders more fat than muscle. Even without the pallor of death he would have been pasty white. Milk-bottle skin, with moles and a faint scarlet rash.

  And no kneecaps. Both hairy legs had ragged holes in them where a normal person would keep their knees. The flesh was torn and tattered around the joint, yellow bone poking through the mess of hacked-up tissue. Whoever had done this hadn't been bothered about making a tidy job of it. This was unelective surgery by enthusiasm rather than skill.

  Logan's eyes moved past the gore. There were distinct ligature marks around both ankles. The wrists too. Angry bruises, torn skin. The signs of a struggle. He winced. From the look of things Geordie had been tied up and awake while one of the McLeod boys took his kneecaps off. Hack after hack. And George Stephenson had been a big lad. He would've put up one hell of a fight. So it was both McLeods: Colin and Simon. One to hold him down, the other to wield the machete.

  There were other marks too. Contusions, scrapes, damage from floating about in the harbour all night. What looked like teeth-marks.

  Logan hadn't read the post mortem report yet, but he recognized bite-marks when he saw them. He squatted down beside the body and peered at the indentations. Dark purple weals in the pale skin. Slightly irregular, as if a few teeth were missing. He didn't think of the McLeods as being biters. Not Simon anyway. Colin? There always was something not right about that boy, from the moment he'd jammed a live cat onto the railings surrounding Union Terrace Gardens to the time he'd been caught taking a crap on his grandmother's tombstone. Not right. And he didn't have a full set of choppers, due to a bottle fight in a karaoke bar. He'd have to get Forensics to make a cast of the bite. See if they couldn't match it up to Colin McLeod's dental records.

  The door banged behind him and he straightened up to see Isobel deep in conversation with her assistant, Brian, who finished saying something and made a big, expansive gesture with his hands. Isobel threw back her head and laughed.

  Oh Brian, you're so damn funny with your floppy girl's hair and your massive nose. Was this the bit of rough DI Steel was talking about? Even with his stomach full of stitches Logan could kick the shite out of him in two minutes flat. How was that for rough?

  Isobel stopped laughing as soon as she saw him standing there over the naked body of Geordie Stephenson. 'Hello?' she said, flushing slightly.

  'I have an ID for this gentleman.' Logan's voice was slightly less warm than the corpse.

  'Ah, right…' She looked at him, then at the body laid out on the slab. She gestured to her assistant. 'Well…Brian will be able to help you.' She flashed a brittle smile, and then she was gone.

  Brian took down George Stephenson's details, scribbling them down in a little pad. Logan was finding it very difficult to keep his voice polite and even. Was this little shite of a man screwing Isobel? Did she make those small mewing noises for him?

  Brian spiked the last full stop with a flourish and popped the pad back in his jacket. 'Oh, and before you go I've got something for you…' he said.

  Logan had the sudden feeling he was going to pull a pair of Isobel's panties out of his pocket but instead Brian crossed the room and picked a large manila envelope out of the internal mail tray.

  'Bloodwork on your unknown four-year-old girl. Some interesting stuff in there.' He handed the envelope over then busied himself zipping up Geordie's body-bag and tidying the corpse away while Logan flipped through the report.

  Brian wasn't kidding. It was very interesting. In the canteen at lunchtime there was only one topic of conversation: was DI Insch for the chop? Logan ate in silence at a table as far away from everyone else as possible. The lasagne tasted like damp newspaper to him.

  A wave of silence went through the room and Logan looked up to see DI Insch walking up to the counter for his usual: scotch broth, macaroni cheese and chips, jam sponge and custard.

  'Please God,' said Logan under his breath, 'let him sit somewhere else…'

  But Insch took one look round the canteen, fixed his eyes on Logan and made a beeline for his table.

  'Afternoon, sir.' Logan pushed the half-eaten lasagne away.

  To his immense relief DI Insch just grunted a hello and started in on his soup. And when that was all gone he launched himself at the macaroni, drowning the chips in salt and vinegar, smothering the cheesy pasta with black pepper. Munch, munch, munch.

  Logan felt daft, just sitting there, watching the inspector eat. So he poked at his lasagne with a fork. Breaking down the layers into a big homogeneous mush. 'Got the bloodwork back on the little dead girl,' he said at last. 'She was pumped full of painkillers. Temazepam mostly.'

  Insch's eyebrow shot up.

  'It wasn't enough to kill her. Not an overdose or anything, but it looked like she'd been on them for a while. The lab thinks it would have kept her spaced out. Docile.'

  The last of the pasta disappeared into Insch and a chip used to mop up the remaining, vinegar-laced, cheese sauce. He chewed thoughtfully. 'Interesting,' he said at last. 'Anything else?'

  'She had TB at some point.'

  'Now we're getting somewhere.' Insch stacked his empty plate on top of the soup bowl and pulled his dessert to centre stage. 'Not that many places in the UK you can still catch TB. Get onto the health boards. It's a notifiable disease. If our girl had it she'll be on their lists.' He scooped up a spoonful of custard and sponge, a smile on his lips. 'About bloody time we got some good luck.'

  Logan didn't say anything.

  20

  Matthew Oswald had worked for the council for six months, straight out of school with fewer qualifications than his mother had been hoping for. His father didn't care that much. He'd never got a qualification in his life and it hadn't done him any harm, had it? So Matthew picked up his lunchbox and went to work for Aberdeen City Council's sanitation department.

  The life of a scaffy wasn't as bad as a lot of people thought. You got out in the fresh air, the guys were a laugh, the pay wasn't that bad, and if you screwed up nobody died. And, since the invention of the wheelie-bin, there wasn't much heavy lifting. Not like in the old days, as Jamey, the driver of their wagon, liked to say.

  So, all in all, life was OK. A bit of money in the bank, mates at work and a new girlfriend who wasn't shy about letting him get his hand up her jumper.

  And then came the offer of overtime. He should have said no, but more cash meant a season ticket to the football. Matthew lived for Aberdeen Football Club. Which was why he was now dressed in a blue plastic boiler suit, black Wellington boots, thick black rubber gloves, safety goggles and a breathing mask. The only skin showing was where his forehead didn't quite fit under the boiler suit's elasticated hood. He looked like something out of the X-Files and was sweating like a bastard.

  The sleet pounding down out of the dark grey sky didn't make any difference to the sweat running down his back and into his boxers. But there was no way in hell he was taking the damn rubber rompersuit off!

  Grunting, he lifted the shovel up to shoulder height and stuffed another load of rotting carcasses into the huge waste container. Everything stank of death. Even through the breathing mask he could smell it. Rotting meat. Vomit. He'd lost his breakfast and lunch yesterday. Not today though. Today he'd kept his Weetabix where they were supposed to be.

  All bloody day yesterday and all bloody day today. And from the look of it all bloody day tomorrow. Shovelling up dead animals.

  The filthy bastard who owned the place was standing in the doorway to one of the steadings, the one they'd cleared out yesterday. He didn't seem to notice the sleet either, just stood there in a ratty jumper looking miserable as his sicko collection was carte
d away.

  Matthew had seen his dad's paper this morning. Some parents in Garthdee had beaten the shite out of the bloke for hanging round their kids' school. The man's face was a patchwork of purple-and-green bruises. Served him fucking right, thought Matthew as he trudged back through the sleet for another shovelful of rotting corpses.

  They were almost halfway through the pile in this building. One-and-a-half down, one-and-a-half to go. Then it would be a long shower, a season ticket and drinking till he puked. He was going to get so wasted when this was over!

  Thinking such happy thoughts, Matthew rammed his shovel into the mound of festering meat and fur. The pile slithered and slipped as he worked. Cats and dogs and seagulls and crows and fuck knows what else. Gritting his teeth, he hefted the mound of dead things on the end of his shovel. And then he saw it.

  Matthew opened his mouth to say something – to call over the nervous bloke from the council who was supposed to be running things here, tell him what he'd found. But what came out was a high-pitched scream.

  He dropped his shovelful of dead things and raced outside, slipping, slithering, falling to his knees; ripping off his breathing mask, throwing up his Weetabix into the snow. Logan was parked on the other side of the road from the Turf 'n Track, watching the betting shop through the sleet and a pair of binoculars. The weather was horrendous. The delicate fall of snow he'd seen this morning had let up for a while and then this had started. Thick globs of sleet hammering down out of the filthy sky, cold and wet and treacherous. It was already getting dark.

  He'd phoned every health authority in the country, asking them for details of any little girls they'd treated for TB in the last four years. Like DI Insch he was optimistic; this should be a straightforward bit of policing. She'd had TB and now she was better. Which meant that she must have been treated at one of the health authorities. She'd be on their books. And Logan would have a name.

  The latest jingly jangly tune finished on the radio and the DJ announced the mid-afternoon news. Logan stuffed an extra strong mint into his mouth and turned it up slightly.

  'Closing arguments continue today in the case of Gerald Cleaver, the fifty-six-year-old from Manchester accused of sexual abuse while working as a male nurse at Aberdeen Children's Hospital. With almost three weeks of testimony behind them, most of which has been extremely graphic and disturbing, the jury is expected to retire late tomorrow evening. Police security has been stepped up following a number of threats to Cleaver's life. Cleaver's lawyer, Mr Moir-Farquharson, who has himself been the target of death threats during the trial, was assaulted two nights ago when someone threw a bucket of pig's blood over him.'

  Logan gave a small cheer and a one-man Mexican wave in the driver's seat of the rusty pool car.

  'I will not be intimidated by the work of a tiny, misdirected, minority.' The new voice was Sandy the Snake's. 'We have to make sure that justice is done here-'

  Logan drowned out the rest with booing and loud raspberries.

  There was movement across the road and he sat up straight, peering through his binoculars. The front door to the shop opened and Desperate Doug stuck his head out, took one look at the weather and stuck his head back in again. Thirty seconds later Winchester, the large Alsatian who'd been desperate to take a chunk out of Logan yesterday, was unceremoniously booted out into the sleet. The dog tried to get back in, was belted with Dougie's walking stick, then stood dejected as the door closed in its face. It stayed there for a minute, the sleet soaking into its greying fur, staring at the shop and then loped down the concrete steps into the car park. It circled a few times: sniffing the lampposts, the metal banister, peeing on some, ignoring others. Then at last it bunched its backend in under itself and gingerly coiled a huge turd in the middle of the car park.

  That done, it turned and barked its head off at the Turf 'n Track's front door until Desperate Doug got up to let it in again. Two steps inside the betting shop and the Alsatian shook itself dry, sending a flurry of water and melting sleet all over its owner.

  Suddenly Logan liked the dog a lot more. He settled back in his seat and let the radio's music wash over him.

  A rust-green estate car lurched past his window, turned right into the small collection of shops, and slid to a halt in the newly beturded car park. It was the same car WPC Watson had hurled all that abuse at. Logan sighed. He was back to thinking of her as WPC Watson. Not Jackie of the Lovely Legs any more. And all because he had to tell her off for swearing at the driver of that ruddy car.

  The estate car's driver rummaged about for something on the back seat, then hopped out clutching a plastic carrier bag and nearly fell on his backside in the slush. He had the collar of his jacket turned up and a newspaper held over his shaved head, trying to keep the worst of the weather off. He slipped and slid his way up the disabled ramp to the bookies.

  Logan frowned and turned the binoculars on the newcomer as he pushed his way through the door into the shop. The man's ears were festooned with piercings and he had a haunted look that was instantly recognizable: Duncan Nicholson. The same Duncan Nicholson who'd just happened to fall over the murdered body of a three-year-old boy. In a waterlogged ditch, hidden beneath a sheet of chipboard in the dark, in the pouring rain.

  'What are you doing here, you little toerag?' Logan asked himself quietly.

  Mastrick wasn't local for Nicholson. He lived in the Bridge of Don, well across the city. Big journey to make on a shitty day like this.

  And then there was that carrier bag. Or what was in it.

  'I wonder…'

  But Logan's trail of thought was shattered as the police radio spluttered into life. They'd found another body. It was dark by the time Logan reached the farm on the outskirts of Cults. The gate was open, a patrol car parked next to it containing a pair of unhappy-looking constables, just visible through the fogged-up windscreen. They were blocking access to the farm road. Logan pulled up next to them and rolled down his window. The PC in the driver's seat did the same.

  'Afternoon, sir,'

  'What's the story?'

  'DI Insch is here, so's the Fiscal. Duty doctor's just arrived. IB are stuck in traffic. And there's about six blokes from the council in one of the steadings. We had to restrain them from killing the property's owner.'

  'Roadkill?'

  'Yup. He's holed up in the farmhouse with Insch. The inspector doesn't want him going anywhere till death's been declared.'

  Logan nodded and started to wind up his window. The sleet was beginning to blow into the car.

  'Sir?' asked the PC behind the wheel of the patrol car. 'Is it true we had him in custody last night and let him go?'

  Logan felt a sickening lurch in the pit of his stomach. He'd been thinking the same thing ever since he'd heard. Worrying all the way over from Mastrick. They'd released Roadkill without charge and now another child was dead. He'd even given the guy a lift!

  The sleet was thickening, turning into flurries of real snow as Logan slithered the pool car up the rutted driveway towards Roadkill's farm. The steadings loomed out of the dark, the car's headlights picking out the open doors.

  Blue police tape was stretched across the doorway of steading number two. The one they'd been emptying today.

  Logan pulled up behind the duty doctor's car. There was another patrol car here, empty this time. Its occupants would be taking statements from the guys who'd found the body. Stopping them from tearing Roadkill to pieces. The only car not parked next to the snow-shrouded waste containers was DI Insch's Range Rover. The big four-by-four was the only one that could handle the rutted drive in the snow. It was abandoned in front of the farmhouse. A faint yellow light flickered in one of the downstairs windows.

  Logan looked from the steading with its warning tape to the farmhouse, fading in and out of view through the growing blizzard. Might as well get the nasty bit over and done with.

  It was freezing cold outside and as soon as Logan killed his car lights it was dark as well. He jumped bac
k in the car and dug a flashlight out from under a pile of posters with Peter Lumley's face on them. Please God: let it be him. Don't let it be some other poor little bastard. Not another one.

  The torch dispelled just enough darkness for Logan to see where he was putting his feet. The snow was building up in the hollows and potholes, hiding them, making it far too easy to slip and fall. Logan stumbled his way through the grass to steading number two, the fat snowflakes sticking to his jacket.

  Inside, it smelled terrible. But not as bad as it had on that first day when he'd made PC Steve drag open the heavy wooden door. The wind took away some of the smell, but it was still bad enough to make Logan gag as he crossed the threshold. Coughing, he pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and held it over his nose and mouth.

  Half the carcases were gone and the concrete floor slippery with ooze and decayed body fluids. Doc Wilson, dressed in the regulation white paper boiler suit, was hunched down in front of the pile of corpses, his open medical bag sitting on top of a flattened bin-bag to keep it out of the slime.

  Logan pulled on a set of coveralls. 'Evening, Doc,' he said, carefully picking his way across the concrete.

  The duty doctor turned. A white mask hid the lower part of his face. 'How come when it's a messy job it's always me gets called, eh?'

  'Just lucky I guess,' said Logan. The humour was forced, but the doctor managed a small smile behind his mask.

  He pointed at the open bag and Logan helped himself to a pair of latex gloves and a mask. The smell suddenly vanished, replaced by an overwhelming reek of menthol that made his eyes water. 'Vicks VapoRub,' Doc Wilson said. 'Old pathology trick. Covers a multitude of sins.'

  'What are we looking at?'

  Please God let it be Peter Lumley.

  'Difficult to tell. The poor wee sod's nearly rotted all away.'