Bury Them Deep

by Oswald, James

  McLean filled them in on his trip to Bestingfield and the unsatisfying interview with Bale, the forensic examination of the bone site, Grace Ramsay’s unexpected appearance and the rest of the day’s misadventures.

  ‘And, just to top it all, I’ve spent the past hour or so talking to Jo Dalgliesh,’ he added. ‘That’s what I was coming to tell you about.’

  ‘You’ve what?’ Robinson’s response was predictable. ‘You should know better than to go mouthing off to the press, McLean. We sack junior officers for doing that.’

  Every time. ‘Actually, sir. I didn’t tell her anything she didn’t already know. This place leaks like a colander, and it’s only going to get worse the shorter-staffed we are. Never thought I’d admit it, but actually Dalgliesh is a lot of help. Unlike some of the gutter press, she at least gives us a little heads up before telling the world we’ve a mass-murdering cannibal on the loose.’

  The silence that followed his words lasted far longer than McLean thought reasonable. His attention was focused on the DCC, but he risked a sideways glance at McIntyre. Her eyes were as wide as Robinson’s.

  ‘That’s the line they’re going with?’ she asked.

  ‘The more sensational the headline the better, I expect. Thought you might want to know so we can make a start on our response.’

  ‘Shit.’ Robinson sat down heavily in his seat. ‘I guess we were going to have to come clean sooner or later. They know we found bones up on the moor, and now there’s a bloody archaeological dig going on up there.’

  ‘They also know Renfrew is missing, and what she was getting up to in the car park.’

  ‘You think any of them want a job?’ McIntyre asked. ‘They’re way ahead of us on this one.’

  ‘Don’t joke about it, Jayne.’ The DCC rubbed at his face with tired hands.

  ‘Who said I was joking?’

  ‘We’ll need to set something up for tomorrow.’ McLean unclenched his fists, began counting off points on his fingers. ‘Nip the more lurid speculation in the bud. We can’t put off telling people exactly what we’ve found up on the moors for ever, and knowing Dalgliesh she’ll try to make a link between them and Anya Renfrew.’

  Robinson glared at McLean in disbelief. ‘Is there a link?’

  ‘To be honest, I have no idea. The bones aren’t hers, that’s for sure. They’ve been up there too long for that. Of course, that means we’ve no idea who they belong to, let alone how they got there.’

  ‘Do we know anything at all, McLean?’ The DCC looked like he was about to start pulling his hair out. McLean knew how he felt.

  ‘Not nearly enough, but I think Grace Ramsay might be able to help us.’ That got him blank looks and silence, which on balance was the best result he could have hoped for. ‘She’s been tracking missing-persons cases in the area since the nineteen seventies. Duguid thinks she’s obsessed beyond the point of madness, but I think she might be on to something.’

  ‘Something how?’ Robinson asked, his voice edged with disbelief.

  ‘That’s what I’m hoping to find out tomorrow, sir. She’s going to come in and address the morning briefing.’

  McLean walked down the corridor away from a worried deputy chief constable’s office, McIntyre keeping an easy pace beside him. They had the vaguest of plans for a press statement to go out in the morning but he could see already that it was only going to lead to more questions. Right now he was more concerned with getting home on time, but he knew better than to glance nervously at his watch too often.

  ‘How did the meeting at HQ go? I never did find out what it was meant to be about.’

  McIntyre gave him a sideways glance that could have cut through steel. ‘If you ever read your emails –’ she started, then shook her head slightly. ‘Probably just as well you were out there doing actual police work rather than sitting in a stuffy room listening to the NCA moan about their budgets being stretched.’

  ‘NCA? I thought they were loaded.’

  ‘Aye, they are. Still not happy, mind. Particularly since Operation Caterwaul looks like it’s going to fizzle out before it’s even started. And they’ve been keeping tabs on a few “Very Important People”.’ McIntyre made bunny ears with her fingers as she said the words. ‘Seems there’s a list you get onto by being obscenely wealthy or involved in crucial technology. It might surprise you to know there’s a number of Scots on that list, although most of them live and work in the US these days.’

  McLean tensed, certain that the detective superintendent was going to bring up the name of Jane Louise Dee at any moment. Life was complicated enough, without the enigmatic Mrs Saifre getting involved.

  ‘Three of them have arrived in the capital in the past week,’ McIntyre continued, unaware of McLean’s anxiety. ‘Apparently it’s just a coincidence. There’s no conference of evil supervillains or anything. But our friends at the NCA get nervous whenever two or more of them are on British soil at the same time. They’re high-profile targets for kidnappers, state-sanctioned terrorists, that sort of thing. They want us to keep an unofficial eye on them while they’re here, so that the public don’t get caught in anything if it happens.’

  ‘Do I know any of these people?’ McLean asked.

  McIntyre stopped mid-stride, forcing him to back up and face her.

  ‘They want us to do their job for them, on our budget, and that’s all you can think about?’

  ‘Sorry. I figured that much out already. Just wondered who these people were to get the NCA all riled up. I’ve no doubt they gave you a superficially good reason why they need our help to deal with their problem.’

  McIntyre stared at him as if she couldn’t quite believe what he’d said. Then she shook her head. ‘Jonathan Scanlan? Dominic Smythe? Gordon McTavish? I know you’re comfortably well off, Tony, but they’re in a different league. Seeing as you’re interested though, I’ll send through all the details and you can coordinate with uniform to rearrange patrols around where they’re staying. Hopefully whatever’s brought them all home will be over soon and we can get back to the real job.’

  McLean sighed. He’d walked into that one. ‘Fine. But it’ll have to wait until tomorrow. I’m off now before Emma chucks me out of my own home.’

  ‘That bad, is it?’ McIntyre asked.

  ‘Not really, no. We’re getting there. Early days though. And we’re meant to be having dinner with Professor Turner and her wife. Em’s got her heart set on studying forensic anthropology now, so my life won’t be worth living if we’re late.’

  McIntyre patted him on the shoulder. ‘Go home, Tony. Have a good evening. Try to relax, aye? The super-rich can wait until morning.’

  47

  Professor Turner lived in a small mid-terrace house in one of the quieter streets in Stockbridge. As McLean stood on the doorstep, the sound of the bell still echoing inside, he looked around at the leafy garden at the end of the road, the other buildings climbing three, sometimes four storeys into the evening sky. It wasn’t far from here that he’d found the body of a dead hedge fund manager in his bath, killed by either a vengeful ghost or a heart attack. His old chief superintendent’s son had died of a drug overdose just a few hundred yards away. Strange how the city presented itself to him as a series of crimes investigated. Cases solved, or at least closed.

  ‘Tony, Emma, do come in.’ Meg’s voice snapped him out of his maudlin daydream. She waved them into a spacious hall, giving both of them hugs this time. ‘Hattie’s getting changed. She came in smelling like the bastard child of a bonfire and a grave, and only half an hour ago.’

  Emma gave him a stare that silenced any comment he might have made. Not that McLean was that stupid. He’d been late enough home and been rushed through the shower and change routine himself. It was reassuring to know that it wasn’t just him though. He handed over the bottle of wine they’d picked up on the way over, receiving an appreciative
noise in return. Then they were both ushered through into the kitchen at the back of the house.

  ‘We don’t have a dining room as such,’ Meg said as she busied herself making something that looked suspiciously like cocktails. ‘Well, we do, but Hattie’s filled it with bones and stuff. Not really the right atmosphere for eating. And besides . . .’ She waved her hand across the room, seemingly unaware of the sharp knife she was holding. ‘. . . eating in the kitchen’s so much more intimate, don’t you think?’

  McLean caught Emma’s eye, and her expression was enough to stop him replying to Meg’s rhetorical question. He would have been just as happy eating bought-in pizza in his own kitchen when the couple had visited them earlier in the week, but saying as much would not have been wise.

  ‘How’s the exhibition going?’ he asked, thinking that was probably a safer topic for conversation. The kitchen walls were dotted here and there with some of Meg’s less gloomy paintings, along with a few choice works by other notable artists.

  ‘Early days. The Scotsman gave me a half-decent write-up, but the other papers haven’t been effusive with their praise. Oh, and I had a very good review from Danielle Murray, of all people. She normally hates my kind of work, but she couldn’t have been nicer.’

  McLean considered what kind of response would be least incriminating or potentially condescending. Fortunately they were interrupted before he had to make a decision.

  ‘I’m so sorry, everyone. It’s been one of those days. No doubt Tony can tell you.’

  All heads turned to see Professor Turner in the kitchen doorway. She was better dressed than the last time McLean had seen her, although the shower-damp hair and kaftan look was from a different decade, a different century. She strode into the room, picked up two of the strange-coloured drinks Meg had prepared and carried them over to where McLean and Emma stood.

  ‘You look like you need one of these,’ she said to Emma. ‘You definitely need one of these,’ she said to McLean.

  ‘What –?’

  ‘You never ask. That’s the rules.’ She went back to the counter and helped herself to another glass, lifted it in salute. ‘Cheers.’

  McLean felt that he had no option but to drink, even if what he really wanted just then was a nice cold beer. The cocktail tasted much like all cocktails tasted, of spirits, a bit too much sugar, and some unidentifiable fruit. At least it was cold.

  ‘I know if I even mention work my life won’t be worth living,’ he said. ‘Meg was telling me about her exhibition.’

  Emma smiled, and all was well in the world.

  It didn’t surprise McLean to learn that Meg was the cook in the household. She was good at it too; her flare for the creative evident in the delicate dishes she served. He was glad to see that they didn’t reflect her obsession with the horrors of genocide. Unless you considered meat to be murder, and counted eating langoustines as pillage of the sea.

  They spoke of inconsequential things, skirting around the tricky subject of work. He, Harriet and Emma were all to some extent involved in the same job, which would have put Meg at a disadvantage anyway. Mass graves and charnel pits weren’t his idea of a great supper topic either.

  ‘Interesting piece on the news earlier,’ Meg said as they ate pudding, the most delicate panna cotta McLean had tasted outside of an expensive restaurant. In deference to the summer heat, the food had been light and fresh, and this was no exception.

  ‘Oh yes?’ He tried not to sound wary, although news often meant crimes and misdemeanours, and that would mean the conversation inevitably turning to work.

  ‘Apparently Gordon McTavish is back in town.’

  ‘Isn’t he a footballer or something?’ McLean asked. He knew the name, knew exactly who they were talking about, but like mass graves and charnel pits, it wasn’t something that he could get excited about. It was work, of course, too, even if he’d only found out earlier that evening. And he’d promised they wouldn’t talk shop.

  ‘Oh come on, Tony. You know perfectly well who he is.’ Emma butted into the conversation a little more loudly than was necessary, perhaps aided by the large glass of white wine she’d consumed after her cocktail, and the half of its refill she had already downed too. When he gave her a look of bafflement she rolled her eyes. ‘Only the third-richest man in the world. Or is it fourth?’

  ‘Not just him either. Jonathan Scanlan somehow managed to get himself a table at Chez Innes in Leith even though the waiting list’s meant to be something like eighteen months. Goes to show how the rich don’t play by the same rules as everyone else.’

  ‘Actually, I could get us a table there with just one call.’ McLean pulled out his phone, half considered flicking through the menu to the contacts page and the number. He contented himself with holding it up as a visual aid to his point. ‘Bobby’s an old friend. He’d be hard pushed to better that pudding though.’

  Meg laughed. ‘Flattery will get you everywhere. But really? You know Bobby Innes?’

  ‘I do, and I’d be happy to introduce you to him and his husband. Not spoken to either of them in far too long. And as to McTavish and Scanlan, yes, I do know who they are. I’m aware that both of them are in town because sadly it’s my job to know.’

  ‘Really?’ Harriet’s voice was all disbelief.

  ‘I did promise Emma I’d not talk about work this evening. I’m sure there are more interesting topics of conversation than the comings and goings of the filthy rich.’

  ‘Yes, but now you’ve mentioned it and we’re all fascinated.’ Meg topped up his wine glass even though McLean hadn’t really touched what was already in it. Not that it wasn’t as good as the rest of the meal; he simply didn’t feel much like drinking.

  ‘It’s not all that interesting really. Just another routine part of the job. People of high net worth, that’s the technical term for billionaires these days. They’d like to tell you they’re just like everyone else, but really they’re not. All that money makes them targets for every terrorist organisation, kidnap gang or just plain crazy out there. They’ve got their own security to deal with things like that, but we keep an eye on them so that ordinary folk don’t get caught in the crossfire.’

  ‘You learn something new every day,’ Meg said. ‘Still, it’s a bit strange the two of them being in Edinburgh at the same time, isn’t it?’

  ‘Three actually. Dominic Smythe’s on the watch list. You know, the tech guy? He has a big house out near Haddington he visits occasionally. According to my friends at the NCA he flew in on a private jet last night. Didn’t bother letting anyone know he was coming.’

  ‘What are they all doing here?’ Meg asked. ‘Is there some financial conference on?’

  ‘Nothing official, that’s for sure. Don’t even think they know each other, particularly. Seems they all just decided to come home at the same time.’

  ‘Maybe they’re all part of some evil secret society, and their leader has called them all home to do his bidding.’

  ‘Her bidding, more like.’ McLean’s words were out before he realised.

  ‘Her? How very feminist of you.’ Meg grinned. ‘Equal opportunities villains. Excellent.’

  ‘Actually, if the filthy rich expat Scots are gathering, I’m surprised Jane Louise Dee hasn’t turned up already. Running a sinister cabal of billionaire sociopaths would be right up her street.’

  That got him a raised eyebrow from Meg, a bark of laughter from Harriet and a strained cough from Emma, followed by a lengthy silence at the table.

  ‘What?’ he asked eventually.

  ‘You sound like you know the woman,’ Meg said.

  ‘We’ve had run-ins. She’s not what everyone might think.’

  ‘She funded some of the work I did in Rwanda,’ Harriet said. ‘Well, the Dee Foundation funded us. It’s all her money at the end of the day though.’

  ‘Have you ever met her
?’ McLean asked.

  ‘Can’t say I’ve had the pleasure.’

  ‘Pleasure’s not the word I’d use. Horrible, horrible woman.’ McLean had been going to say the same thing, perhaps a little less effusively, but Emma beat him to it. Another awkward silence fell on the room, broken finally by Meg’s disbelieving voice.

  ‘Do you really know Bobby Innes? I probably shouldn’t say so in front of a policeman, but I think I’d kill to try some of his duck confit.’

  ‘I did try not to talk about work. Honest.’

  The taxi was warm and dark, and surprisingly didn’t smell of stale vomit. McLean sat in the back with Emma leaning heavily on him, her head in the crook of his neck, her hair smelling of shampoo. He’d not drunk much over the course of the evening, but she’d made up for it. Not to the point of embarrassing herself in front of her soon-to-be professor, but enough that it was as well she had a day off tomorrow. He was too much of a gentleman to try and take advantage, but it was pleasant to be hugged all the same.

  ‘You did very well,’ she said, snuggling up against him in a manner he found most acceptable right up until the moment she pushed herself away. She stared at him, swaying slightly in the half-dark of the taxi’s interior. ‘Were you being serious about your lot following around all those famous rich people?’

  ‘We don’t follow them around, Em. Not like you think anyway. It’s more a case of being aware they’re here and the problems that might arise from that. Kirsty’s dealing with it all anyway. That’s the joy of being a DCI. I can palm off the rubbish jobs on my junior officers.’

  Emma let out what could only be described as a girly giggle, and thumped him weakly on the chest.

  ‘What?’ he asked.

  ‘You’re so full of it sometimes, Tony McLean. “Palm it off on my junior officers”. Like you’ve ever delegated anything.’

  ‘Well, I’ve delegated this one.’ He didn’t have the heart to tell her that it had been Jayne McIntyre who had assigned the duty to Ritchie.