The Third Sin

by Aline Templeton

  With a petulant movement he threw the cushions on the floor and lay down at full length on the bed, not taking his shoes off. They were probably muddy – it was pouring today – but he didn’t care. God, he hated this place!

  He glanced at his watch. Half past four. It would be half past five in Paris and he’d be making an assessment of how much more he needed to clear from his desk before he could pop round to the cafe that was their local for a pastis before they decided where to eat. His gut twisted at the thought.

  He heard the front door opening and then his mother’s commanding tones. ‘Randall – you’re home? Where are you?’

  He heaved himself off the bed. ‘Yes, Mother. I’m upstairs.’

  ‘Come down, then. I’ve got a list of things I’ll need you to do. I’ll put the kettle on.’

  What about, ‘Welcome home, lovely to see you?’ He swore, then glanced at the smears of mud on the pristine white cover. He seized the corner and used it to wipe the rest of the mud off his shoes.

  Why was it that at the sound of his mother’s voice he became a sulky schoolboy again? He was an adult, he didn’t have to take her pushing him around any more. He could just walk out of the door and go—

  Go where? a nasty little voice inside his head murmured. Trying to ignore it, he thrust his hands into his pockets in an attitude of nonchalance and went into the kitchen.

  The kettle was singing and Philippa was standing at the island unit in the Smallbone kitchen that wasn’t quite so designer smart after fifteen years: he could still see the scar on one of the cupboards he had secretly kicked in a fit of impotent rage on his last visit home and there were chips on one or two of the drawers as well. It wasn’t like Philippa to tolerate imperfection and he felt another qualm.

  When he came in she was frowning over a clipboard and looked up, smartly blonde, carefully groomed and with that familiar cold blue gaze. It was presumably his imagination that the temperature in the house had suddenly dropped.

  ‘Get some mugs, will you? I want to go over the list with you.’ She took it over to the table and sat down as, seething, he made tea and brought it to her.

  He looked round. ‘Where would I find biscuits?’

  ‘Biscuits? Oh, there aren’t any. Your father and I don’t eat them.’

  And of course, it never crossed your mind to make any provision for me? he thought but he wasn’t looking for aggro just at the moment.

  ‘Right,’ Philippa said. ‘The first thing is the flower beds round the lawn. They’re a bit out of hand and though we can’t assume it’ll be a good day we’ll want to shove people out into the garden if it’s possible.’

  ‘Why can’t the gardener do it?’

  ‘Gardener – what gardener?’ Philippa gave a mirthless laugh. ‘Laid off last year. You’ll just have to get your hands dirty – unless you’d care to spend some of your lavish salary on getting him back?’

  It had all gone, along with what they’d paid him to go. Gritting his teeth, Randall said, ‘Ha, ha. Funny. I suppose I’d better give it a shot.’

  ‘Oh yes, you’d better. And then I want you to clear the hall and the drawing room – get all the good furniture out to the barn before the peasants get drunk and start falling on it. Get your father to help with the bigger stuff. And clear the shelves too – I don’t want any of my bibelots falling prey to sticky fingers.’

  ‘What’s all this about, anyway – what’s in it for you, going to all this trouble?’ he said sulkily but she ignored his question, only flushing slightly and making an impatient noise. ‘All right, then. Clear the garden, clear the house – anything else?’

  She gave him a tight-lipped smile. ‘Oh, very likely. How long are you staying, anyway?’

  He felt himself tense up. ‘Not sure. I’ve got a bit of leave piling up so I’ll probably hang around for a bit.’ It’s my home, it’s where I grew up …

  ‘Oh.’ Philippa’s voice went flat. ‘Well, I suppose we can find something for you to do for your bed and board after Saturday’s over.’ She had been studying her list; now she looked up sharply. ‘Everything’s all right, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘That’s good. Hurry up with your tea and I’ll take you out and show you what needs doing.’ She got up and looked at him impatiently. ‘Come on, then.’

  Randall drained his mug then followed her, feeling drained himself, empty, a hollow shell of misery.

  With all their different assignments, it was mid afternoon by the time Fleming was able to assemble her team in her fourth-floor office in the police headquarters in Kirkluce.

  She always kept three chairs in front of her desk, with another two set beside the table in the farther corner. There were usually four officers in the team she liked to work with but the arrangement gave her officers a choice of where to sit – something she found instructive. Perching on the table was sometimes evidence of a desire, probably subconscious, to use its height to dominate the meeting; taking one of the other chairs when there was one by the desk available was usually a sign of disengagement.

  She studied them as they came in: Louise Hepburn, bright, vivacious and untidy as always, came in chattering to Tam MacNee. They sat down in front of her just as Andy Macdonald arrived. He was a sound man, Andy, if a bit unimaginative. He must be hitting forty now, though with his dark buzz cut he still looked a lot younger than that. Fleming stifled a sigh as he ignored the vacant chair next to Hepburn in favour of one nearer the table, it was an indication of the friction within the group.

  She had tried banging their heads together, but the best she had achieved was only a sort of armed neutrality. She was very reluctant to split up the team; they were both valuable to operations and their abilities were complementary, so however irritating their infantile spats might be she just had to accept it, ignore it and keep them out of each other’s hair as far as possible.

  DC Ewan Campbell, slight, red-haired and freckled, was last and with a sideways glance at Macdonald, took the seat next to Hepburn.

  Fleming explained the background to their latest assignment. ‘Our immediate priority is to trace the people here who were involved in Julia Margrave’s death. I’ll circulate a copy of the inquest proceedings.

  ‘Briefly, the situation was that she worked for a merchant bank in Edinburgh but came down to Galloway most weekends to stay with her mother who has a house on Balcary Bay. She was into drugs and her death was ascribed to a combination of cocaine and Ecstasy.’

  Hepburn pursed her lips in a silent whistle. ‘Not smart.’

  ‘No,’ Fleming agreed. ‘Drug-taking seems to have been standard in this group that called themselves the “Cyrenaics” – does that mean anything to anyone?’

  ‘Louise is the long-dead tongues expert,’ Macdonald said. ‘She’ll know.’

  It was the sort of joking remark anyone might have made – Hepburn’s degree had included law – but she coloured at the sneer in his voice.

  ‘I do, as it happens,’ she said coldly. ‘They believed that physical pleasure was the only good and maximising it was the only rational purpose of life. Drugs nowadays, I suppose, but then sex, good food, good wine—’

  ‘See their point,’ Campbell made one of his rare interjections.

  MacNee grinned. ‘Not just sure they were thinking of a Scotch pie and a wee half at the time, Ewan. Sounds to me like a recipe for disaster.’

  ‘It’s pretty much a list of the Seven Deadly Sins, isn’t it,’ Macdonald said.

  ‘Certainly the third one,’ Fleming said thoughtfully. ‘Greed, that’s what this is, really – greed of every kind and in this case the consequences certainly were deadly. But we need to ask ourselves what relevance all that had to the reappearance of Connell Kane – if any. There may well be none, but what we are trying to establish is whether anyone knew where Kane was over the past two years.’

  ‘If he was a dealer he’d have contacts,’ Macdonald said. ‘Easy enough for him to disappear.’

/>   Hepburn picked up on that. ‘With friends like that, they could be behind his death as well, if he put a foot wrong. If a cosh was used it’s a pointer in that direction – not the sort of thing you get on the shelves at Homebase, is it?’

  ‘Good point,’ Fleming agreed. ‘DI Harris has run checks but only locally. It would be instructive to find out if any of the Cyrenaics knew where he got supplies from – it could be Glasgow, say—’

  ‘Or Edinburgh.’ MacNee bristled, as usual, at any slight on his native city. ‘Plenty of big boys in Edinburgh too.’

  Fleming stifled a smile. ‘Of course. So that’ll be our first line of attack – though they may not know—’

  ‘Or won’t tell.’ Campbell’s remark was, as usual, to the point.

  ‘Could be afraid to incriminate themselves,’ Macdonald said. ‘When it comes to drugs, what most people do is distance themselves as far as possible. “I didn’t know anything about it, just took a puff occasionally on someone else’s joint.” You can write the script.’

  Hepburn looked sceptical. ‘One of their mates died from drugs – you could probably find one or two people who held that against Kane. Might be happy enough to give us chapter and verse.’

  ‘Didn’t do it at the time, did they?’ Macdonald pointed out, but Hepburn was ready to argue.

  ‘Too dangerous then. You said it yourself – they’d try to show they’d nothing to do with it. Now they’ll know we won’t try to prosecute for possession for private use and might be more ready to talk.’

  ‘If you say so.’ Macdonald crossed his arms, a shut look on his face.

  Fleming sensed MacNee moving impatiently in his seat and said hastily, ‘Either of those may be true. It’s also possible that some of them won’t be happy that he’s been killed. To us he was a drug dealer, scum, but they could have seen him as a friend.’

  ‘Or it could have been one of them killed him,’ Campbell said.

  ‘A friend of Julia’s, say.’ Hepburn picked up on the idea. ‘But how did they get to him? And what brought him back to the area?’

  ‘Business?’ Macdonald joined in. ‘For all we know, he may have still been operating in the drugs trade quite close by—’

  ‘And if someone who wanted revenge for Julia discovered that, they could have seized their opportunity, arranged a meeting—’

  ‘They were friends, after all, he wouldn’t necessarily suspect anything. You could get him in a car, say you were taking him to the pub or something—’

  ‘Right! That would work.’

  Fleming exchanged a sidelong glance with MacNee as Macdonald and Hepburn went on tossing the idea around. She didn’t think it would prove to be as simple as that but it was the first amicable exchange they’d had in a long time and she was happy to let it run.

  At last, the speculation petered out as they came up against the practical problem of taking it forward and Fleming took over.

  ‘We’ve got several theories running now – good. Anyway, this is the current position. Jen Wilson and Logie and Kendra Stewart are still living locally. Logie wasn’t there that night but he ran the pub where the Cyrenaics met. Skye Falconer disappeared immediately after Connell Kane staged his suicide—’

  ‘Is there a connection?’ Hepburn asked.

  ‘Could be. She’s still on the record as missing but as she was an adult and there were no suspicious circumstances it wasn’t followed up. Her father Donald lives in Ballinbreck and by now she may have turned up without him bothering to tell us.

  ‘Will Stewart was a police sergeant and of course was kicked out. No record of him after that. The last of the group, the youngest, works for a merchant bank so we can trace him through them – Randall Lindsay—’

  Hepburn sat bolt upright in her chair. ‘Randall Lindsay?’

  They all stared at her. ‘Know him?’ Fleming asked.

  ‘I’m afraid so. He’s in Paris – I made the mistake of contacting him on Facebook because I’m over there quite a bit, seeing my mother, and I knew him slightly at uni. Tosser!’ She spat the word.

  Macdonald looked amused. ‘What did the poor guy do? Stand you up for a date?’

  Fleming had to repress an impulse to kick his shins – and hers, as Hepburn replied, ‘Au contraire,’ choosing a French phrase to irritate him. ‘I walked out on the date he was offering. He’s a smug, patronising toff with a superiority complex and he brought me out in a rash after five minutes.’

  MacNee patted her arm. ‘Don’t hold back, hen. Why not tell us what you really think?’

  ‘Sorry. But honestly, he is a slimeball. Someone else can interview him – I don’t want him crawling all over me again.’

  Amused, Fleming said, ‘I’ll see what I can do. We’re not shelling out for a trip to Paris just yet anyway.

  ‘I’ve got a meeting tomorrow that I really can’t get out of and I’m going to go back to Dumfries today to have a no-holds-barred conversation with DSI Taylor now we’ve got the go-ahead.

  ‘Andy and Ewan – I want you to talk to Jen Wilson and Donald Falconer, Skye’s father. Tam, you and Louise can take Logie and Kendra Stewart as a priority. Anything else may have to wait – there’s no overtime on this one as yet. Tomorrow you’ll have time for any follow-ups that are needed. Let’s hope we get a lead from at least one of them. Any questions? No? Right. Report back to me – I should be out of the meeting by then.’

  As the others filed out, MacNee hung back. ‘Thought we’d a breakthrough in the kindergarten for a wee moment there.’

  Fleming sighed. ‘Andy can’t resist needling and Louise’s back goes up like a cat’s and she starts spitting. But they’re both useful, Tam.’

  ‘Oh, aye. If you ask me, they’re enjoying it.’

  ‘I’m not,’ Fleming said bitterly. ‘And it’s all right tossing ideas around but I don’t think we’re even beginning to skim the surface with this one.’

  DI Len Harris came out of DSI Taylor’s office in the Dumfries Headquarters with a thunderous look on his face. He hadn’t expected to have a problem with him once he got that bitch out of the way, but Taylor had shown the stubbornness of the weak man, insisting that Fleming took control.

  ‘The thing is, Tom, the lads won’t wear it,’ he had said confidently right at the start. ‘She’s coming in on to our patch—’

  ‘We’re not supposed to have patches any more,’ Taylor pointed out.

  Harris’s jaw tensed. ‘Yes, of course. No one’s readier to cooperate than I am. But it’s a question of man management. She needs to be tactful, tread carefully, not come in throwing her weight around.’

  Taylor shifted in his seat. ‘Well, I’m sorry. I suppose she can be – well, a bit abrasive, if you like. But we’ve no alternative, Len. What have we got to show for what we’ve spent already?’

  ‘For God’s sake, this is a complex case! We’re not going to come up with the answers right away. This comes across to me as you having no confidence in your own people. No wonder that morale is at a low ebb.’

  ‘Is it?’ Taylor winced. ‘Well, I’m sorry about that. But I can’t do anything about it, Len—’

  ‘Not can’t, won’t,’ Harris had retorted. Leaving his superior officer chewing his lip, he walked out.

  He’d called a meeting earlier before going, as he thought, to get the lines of authority sorted out. The Dumfries Division detectives would be there waiting for him now that he had failed and the prospect of humiliation left him seething with impotent rage.

  He couldn’t take Fleming on openly without Taylor’s support and truth to tell he was almost at a standstill on the investigation, unable to think where to go next, if the grey car really did prove to be the distraction Fleming obviously thought it was. He had almost reached the CID room when desperation produced the inspiration he needed.

  If she wasn’t able to crack it either, they would blame her not him, and it was still in his power to spike her guns at the operational level. It would be pure joy to watch her fail.

/>   An expectant silence fell as he came into the room. He knew there were mutterings within the CID already about the way things were going and while he had his own men, the men he could count on to back him, there were others – the two female detectives, for instance – who would go over to the enemy given half a chance. He even saw one roll her eyes to the other as he came in; he’d make them pay for that later.

  ‘Right, lads,’ he said. ‘We’ve been shafted. Apparently we’re not good enough to investigate our own cases without Galloway coming in to tell us what to do. Of course we’re humbly grateful. Forelocks will be tugged whenever she appears.’

  One of the female detectives sat up sharply. ‘She? Is it DI Fleming?’

  Harris glared at her. ‘Yes, it is, as it happens, Weston. Friend of yours?’

  DC Lizzie Weston met his gaze without flinching. ‘No, but she’s got a pretty good reputation.’

  ‘Then of course we must be very grateful to her for condescending to come, mustn’t we, lads? Grateful and very, very humble.’

  That got a sycophantic titter and Harris went on. ‘Our first instruction is that we’re to comb the banks of the Solway. Sounded to me like work for the uniforms but she’s decided we’re to do that while she applies her elevated mind to doing the thinking for us.’ He was pleased to hear a little murmur of resentment.

  ‘She’s got a theory the car went into the water somewhere else, miles away and travelled on the tide like a surfer. As if, but she’s the big boss now.

  ‘So I’m detailing you, Weston, and your little friend Jamieson to work your way down the banks of the Solway, checking it out. She’d probably like you to make it a fingertip search, to make sure you don’t miss anything.’

  He waited for a laugh that didn’t come then went on, a little tetchily, ‘Well, apart from that we’ll carry on with enquiries as we’ve planned. We haven’t traced the grey car yet and we need to pull out all the stops to find where the man came from. I’ll be circulating his mugshot and you’ll be briefed tomorrow on your allocations. Any questions?’