Pray for the Dying

by Quintin Jardine

  It was addressed to Chief Constable Antonia Field, from the Australian Federal Police Association, inviting her to address its annual conference, to be held in Sydney, the following December.

  He scribbled a note, ‘Call the sender, tell them about Toni’s death. If he asks me to do it, decline with regret on the ground that I have no idea where I’ll be in December,’ clipped it to the letter and dropped it into his out-tray.

  He worked on for ten minutes, finding it more and more difficult to maintain his concentration. He felt his eyes grow heavy and realised for the first time that he had missed lunch. A week before he would have poured himself a mug of high-octane coffee, but Sarah had made him promise to give up, and he had promised himself that he would never cheat on her again, in any way. Instead, he took a king-size Mars Bar from his desk drawer and consumed it in four bites.

  As he waited for the energy boost to hit his system, he picked up his direct telephone, found a number and dialled it.

  He hoped that it would be Marina who answered rather than Sofia; and so it was.

  ‘Bob Skinner,’ he announced.

  ‘Good afternoon. This is a pleasant surprise . . . do you have something to tell us about Antonia’s death?’

  ‘No, sorry. In fact I have something to ask you. When were you going to get round to telling me about Toni’s child?’

  He counted the silence; one second, two seconds, three . . .

  ‘Ah, so you know about that.’

  ‘Of course. You must have realised that the post-mortem was bound to reveal it.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose I did. Maman and I hoped you wouldn’t regard it as relevant. It isn’t really, is it?’

  ‘Probably not,’ he agreed, ‘but when we set out to create a picture of someone’s life, it has to be complete. We can’t leave things out, arbitrarily, for personal, or even for diplomatic, reasons.’

  ‘No, I accept that now. We should have volunteered it.’

  ‘What happened to the child?’

  ‘She’s here, with us. When you visited us the other day, she was upstairs, playing in the nursery that Antonia made for her there. She was born in Mauritius, two years ago. Her name is Lucille; she’s such a pretty little thing. Normally she lives in London, with Maman, in a house that Antonia’s father bought for them. He is widowed now, and when he heard of the child he was overwhelmed. He had never recognised my sister as his daughter, not formally, not until then.’

  ‘Does he know she’s dead?’

  ‘Oh yes. Maman called him, straight away. She said he was very upset. So he should have been. I don’t care for the man, even though I’ve never met him.’

  ‘Who’s Lucille’s father?’ Skinner asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Marina confessed. ‘Antonia never told me, and she never told Maman. But she registered the birth herself, in Mauritius. You should be able to find out there.’

  ‘That’s right,’ he agreed, ‘we should.’ We should, he thought, but some bugger doesn’t want us to.

  ‘When you do, will you let me know, please. Maman and I have been looking for Lucille’s birth certificate among Antonia’s papers, but we can’t find it.’

  ‘Sure, will do. But until then we’re guessing. Those men friends you told me about, her lovers: she never gave you any clue to their names?’

  ‘No, not really. She gave one or two of them nicknames. The DAC in the Met, for example, she called him “Bullshit”, for whatever unimaginable reason. The mandarin she called “Chairman Mao”, and the QC was always “Howling Mad”. Other than that, she never let anything slip.’

  ‘You mentioned five men in her life,’ the chief said, ‘but when we met you said she’d had six relationships in the time you lived with her. Was the sixth Michael Thomas?’

  She laughed. ‘Him?’ she exclaimed. ‘You know about that?’

  ‘The whole bloody force seems to know about that. He was seen leaving the flat she was renting, far too late for it to have been a work visit.’

  ‘Then that was careless of her, and not typical. It was very definitely a one-night stand. It was also the only time that she ever had a man when she and I were under the same roof. Actually, I found it quite embarrassing,’ she confessed. ‘The walls were thin.’ He heard what might have been a giggle. ‘It’s very off-putting to hear your sister faking it. Next morning I complained. She laughed and said not to worry, that it had been what she described as “tactical sex” and wouldn’t happen again.

  ‘No,’ she continued, ‘her most recent relationship was still going on, and had been for at least three months. I’m more than a little surprised that I haven’t heard from the poor man; he must be distraught, for they were close. For the first time I sensed that there was no motive behind the relationship, nothing “tactical” about it.’

  ‘I don’t suppose she told you his name, either.’

  ‘Ah, but this time she did,’ Marina exclaimed. ‘That’s why I believe it was serious. She told me he is called Don Sturgeon, and that he works as an IT consultant. She never brought him home and she never introduced us, but I saw him once when he came to pick her up. He is very attractive: clean-cut, well-dressed, almost military looking.’

  Skinner felt his right eyebrow twitch. ‘Indeed?’ he murmured. ‘Anything else that you can recall about him?’

  ‘Yes,’ she replied at once. ‘His skin tone; it’s almost the same as mine. It made me wonder if he was Mauritian too, and that’s what she saw in him.’

  ‘In this life,’ the chief observed, ‘anything is possible. Marina,’ he exclaimed as a picture formed in his mind, ‘are you doing anything, right now?’

  ‘No. Maman is with Lucille, so I’m free.’

  ‘Then I’d like you to come into the office, quick as you can.’

  Forty-Eight

  Lowell Payne had seen the interior of Westminster Abbey several times, but only on television, when it had been bedecked for royal weddings or draped in black for funerals, and packed with celebrants or mourners. As he stepped inside the great church for the first time, he found himself humming ‘Candle in the Wind’ without quite recalling why.

  It was the sheer age of the place that took hold of him, the realisation when he read the guide that its origins were as old as England itself, and that the building in which he stood went back eight centuries.

  He knew as little of architecture as he did of history, but he appreciated at once that the abbey was not simply a place of worship, but also of celebration, a great theatre created for the crowning of kings and, occasionally, of queens.

  In common with most first-time visitors, he paused at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, wondering for a moment whether the occupant’s nearest and dearest had been told secretly of the honour that had been done him. ‘Somebody must have known,’ he whispered as he looked down, drawing an uncomprehending smile and a nod from a Japanese lady tourist by his side.

  He moved on and found a memorial stone, commemorating sixteen poets of the First World War, recognising not a single name. Charles Dickens he knew, though, and the Brontë sisters, and Rabbie Burns, and Clement Attlee. Stanley Baldwin was lost on him, but somewhere the name Geoffrey Chaucer rang a bell.

  His mobile did not ring, but it vibrated in his pocket. He took it out, feeling as if he was committing a form of sacrilege, until he realised that half of the tourists in the place were using smart-phones as cameras.

  He read the screen and took the call. ‘Chief,’ he said, keeping his voice as low as he could, and moving away from the throng of which he had become a part.

  ‘Where the hell are you?’ Skinner asked. ‘You at the station already?’

  ‘No, I’ve got time to kill, so I’m doing the tourist thing. Does the name Stanley Baldwin mean anything to you?’

  ‘Of course. He was a Tory prime minister between the wars, and even less use than most of them. He took a hard line on Mrs Simpson and made the King abdicate, but he didn’t mind Hitler nearly as much. Bloody hell, Lowell, what d
id you do at school? You’ll be asking me who Attlee was next.’

  ‘No, I know about him. What can I do for you?’

  ‘Cancel your return flight. I’d like you to stay down there overnight. Can you do that?’

  ‘Sure. Has there been a development?’

  ‘Maybe. I’m not sure. But if something plays out . . .’ His voice drifted off with his thoughts for a few seconds. ‘I’ll know in a couple of hours, but meantime you just hang on down there. I’ll be back in touch.’

  The conversation ended with as little ceremony as it had begun, leaving Payne staring at his phone. ‘If you say so, Bob,’ he murmured. ‘I wonder if I can put a West End show on expenses.’

  Forty-Nine

  Skinner smiled as he gazed at the ceiling. Stanley Baldwin, he thought. He guessed where Payne had been when he had reached him. The abbey was one of his favourite stopping-off places when he was in London.

  London. For all that the prospect of an independently governed Scotland was looming, the great monolith in the south remained the centre of power. He had decided that he would vote ‘Yes!’ with his heart in the referendum, but he had no illusions over the difficulty his country faced in extricating itself from the British state, if that was what the majority chose.

  Scotland might become a nation, fully self-governing, a member of both the European Union and the UN, but it would still share a head of state and an island with its English neighbours and their common problems of security would remain. He knew better than most what that would mean. MI5 would continue to operate north of what would have become a national border.

  Even if a future first minister had access to its work and to those of its secrets that affected his interests, he would have a very small voice in decisions that affected its remit and its funding, and no control at all over its activities. Strings would continue to be pulled in secret, by secret people, like his friend Amanda Dennis and her immediate boss, Sir Hubert Lowery, the director of the service.

  It would be up to the new Scotland to come to terms with the need to have its own counter-espionage service, to protect itself against potential threats from wherever they came, even if that was Westminster. He had discussed this with Clive Graham, at a meeting so private that he had kept it from Aileen. Whatever their differences on the unification of the police forces, the two men were agreed that if the time came, their country would need its own secret service. There was also an understanding over the man who would head it.

  His smile was long gone when the phone sounded; he flicked the switch that put it on speaker. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Sir,’ a woman replied, ‘it’s PC May in reception. I’m very sorry to bother you, and I wouldn’t normally, but there’s a man here, an odd-looking wee chap, and he’s asking to see you. He won’t give me his name but he says to tell you that he’s been sent by Mr McGuire in Edinburgh. What should I do?’

  ‘He’s okay,’ Skinner told her. ‘He’s a tradesman I need to solve a practical problem. Take him to the lift, then come up with him to this floor, straight away. I’ll meet you there and take charge of him.’

  He hung up and walked from his office. He was waiting by the elevator door when it opened less than two minutes later. A small wiry man with a pinched face and a jailhouse complexion stepped out.

  The chief looked towards his escort. ‘Thanks, Constable. I’ll call you to come and collect him when we’re done. By the way,’ he added. ‘I’m expecting another visitor quite soon. Let me know directly he arrives.’

  She was nodding as the lift door closed, leaving Skinner alone with his visitor. ‘Well, Johan,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s good to see you, under different circumstances from the usual.’

  Johan Ramsey was dressed in baggy jeans and brown jerkin, over a Rangers football top that his host judged, from its design, to be at least three seasons old. He was one of those people whose only expression was furtive. ‘Is this legit?’ he asked.

  Skinner laughed. ‘Johan, I’m the chief fucking constable; of course it’s legit. A wee bit unorthodox, that’s all. Come on.’

  He led the way to his office, and into his private room, where he pulled aside the door that concealed the safe. ‘That’s the problem,’ he said. ‘My predecessor took the combination to her grave, and I can’t open it. Six digits, I’m told.’

  Ramsey took a pair of spectacles with one leg from a pocket in his jerkin, and perched them on the narrow bridge of his nose. He appraised the task for a few seconds, then nodded, and declared, ‘A piece of piss,’ with a degree of pride. ‘If you’ll just step into the other room, sir, Ah’ll have it open in a couple of minutes.’

  The chief’s jaw dropped, then he laughed. ‘Jo, if you think I’m leaving you alone in here, you’re daft.’

  The little man pouted. ‘Professional secrets, Mr Skinner,’ he protested.

  ‘My arse! Jo, you’re a professional fucking thief! I don’t know what’s in the bloody thing. Tell you what, I’ll stand behind you, so I can’t see your hands.’ He took five twenty-pound notes from his wallet and waved them before the safe-cracker’s eyes. ‘And there’s these,’ he added.

  ‘What about ma train fare?’

  Skinner snorted, but produced another twenty. ‘There you are: and a couple of pints when you get home. Now get on with it.’

  ‘Aye, okay.’

  He turned and hunched over the safe. The chief saw him reach inside his jacket again then insert a device that could have been a hearing aid in his ear. Everything else was hidden to him; all he could see were small movements of Ramsey’s shoulders.

  ‘A couple of minutes’ he had said, and it took no longer, until there was a click, and the safe swung open.

  ‘Piece of piss, Ah told ye. Three four eight five’s the combination. Four digits, no’ six.’

  Skinner smiled as he handed over the notes. ‘Do you know what “recidivist” means, Johan?’ he asked.

  ‘No, sir,’ Ramsey replied as he pocketed them.

  ‘No, I didn’t think so. Do me one favour, even though it’ll be a big one for you. Try not to get nicked again on my patch, whether it’s here or in Edinburgh. This can’t get you any favours, and I really don’t want to have to lock you up again. Come on, let’s get you back home. Remember, you were never here.’

  His desk phone rang again as they stepped back into his office. He picked it up.

  ‘PC May again, sir. Your next visitor’s arrived.’

  ‘Good timing,’ he said. ‘Bring him up, and you can take this one back.’

  Fifty

  ‘When will they be in court?’ Viola Murphy asked, as soon as Dan Provan had finished reading the formal charges, and the two accused had been taken away to complete the bail formalities.

  ‘Ah can’t say,’ he replied, ‘but we’ll let you know. Will you be defending them both?’

  ‘Probably, unless either one of them changes their mind and decides to plead not guilty; in that event, there could be a conflict. Does Skinner mean it? Will he press for custodial sentences?’

  ‘From what Ah hear you got on the wrong side of him. Did you think he’s the kind that bluffs?’

  ‘No,’ the lawyer conceded.

  ‘It’s no’ just him. ACC Gorman’s of the same mind.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Listen, Viola, we all are. It’s tough for me, personally, you must know that, but we cannae let this go by wi’ a slap on the wrist, especially for McGlashan. If she goes down, he has tae and all. That would be the case suppose he wasn’t an ex-cop and married to somebody who still is. The fact that he is just underlines it. The fiscal will demand jail. The best you can hope for is a soft-hearted sheriff that gives them less than six months.’

  ‘I’ll ask for a suspended sentence.’

  ‘Ye better no’. He might hang them.’ He winced. ‘Bad joke, Ah know, but you know the bench. Sometimes, the more that lawyers chance their arm, the harder they go. Would ye like some advice?’

  ‘I’ll listen to it,’ she sa
id. ‘Whether I’ll act on it . . .’

  ‘Okay. If I was in the dock, I’d want the youngest, freshest kid in your firm tae do the plea in mitigation. Ah’d even be hopin’ that they made an arse of it, and the judge took pity on them. Because that’s the only way those two will get anything like sympathy from any sheriff in this city.’

  ‘Mmm,’ she murmured. ‘You may well be right. I suppose you should be; you’ve been around long enough to have seen it all. I’ll have a word with my partners, and see what they think. Thanks, Sergeant.’

  The door had barely closed behind her when it opened again. Provan looked up, to see Scott Mann framed there.

  ‘Dan,’ he began. ‘Sarge.’

  The older man bristled. ‘Don’t you fuckin’ call me Sarge.’ He jerked a thumb in the direction of DC Paterson who stood beside him, gathering notes and papers and putting them in order. ‘That’s reserved for colleagues, like Banjo here; for police officers, and that you’re no’. And don’t “Dan” me either. Mr Provan, it can be, but frankly Ah’d prefer nothing at all. Ah’d rather no’ see you again.’

  ‘Will ye put a word in for me?’ Mann begged.

  ‘What? Wi’ the high heid yins? You must be joking.’

  ‘No, I meant wi’ Lottie.’

  The DS started round the table towards him, only to be restrained by Paterson’s strong hand, grabbing him by the elbow. He stopped, gathering himself.

  ‘There is even less chance of that,’ he said when he was ready. ‘From now on, I will do all I can to protect Lottie from you. Now you fuck off out of here, boy, get off wi’ your tart. And be glad you’re leavin’ in one piece. In the old days ye wouldn’t have.’

  Fifty-One