by Tony Black
Angela raised both her hands to her mouth, then quickly put them to her ears, turned away from the screen. ‘Off. Off. Off.’
Henderson scoffed, ‘What?’
‘Turn it off.’ Angela moved towards the mattress on the floor, threw herself down and began to sob. ‘Turn it off. I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to see that place.’
‘What is it?’ Henderson walked round to her side, pointed the remote control at the television, ‘Right there you go, it’s off. What the fuck’s up with you?’
She sat up, screamed at him. ‘Why did you have to come back? … Why? … Why did you have to bring that in here?’
‘It’s just a telly!’
She rose on her knees and started to lash out with her fists, ‘You brought that here … That place.’
She was still lashing out, screaming hysterically as Henderson brought an open palm across her face. She fell sideways onto the mattress and was quiet.
Chapter 6
DI ROB BRENNAN walked into the café on Shandwick Place, nodded to the woman behind the counter and produced a low-voltage smile. She already had the dazed, tired look of someone who was ill-at-ease with their lot; it was barely lunchtime. In Edinburgh, Brennan expected no less; working at a till could hardly afford you enough to cover the bus fares.
‘Coffee please, black,’ he said.
She nodded, retreated to the machine on the counter behind her and started to batter ten bells out of it. Brennan eased himself to the side of the queue of people; the place was filling up.
He had been home, caught a few hours’ sleep, but his mind never really relaxed. He could still see the image of the bloodless girl, dead in a field on the outskirts of the city. He knew it would never leave him. There were cases that he had worked when he was still in uniform, still buddied to a proper officer, that haunted him to this day. Death was always with him.
Brennan looked around the café; most people were dead anyway, he thought. Couples of varying ages stared out into the bright, over-lit, open-plan area. Few of the assembled made eye contact. Or even attempted conversation. Their mouths opened and closed like fish as they gnawed on shortbread biscuits and supped beverages that they didn’t really want anyway.
They were dead. If any were alive once, they didn’t know it, or, had forgotten it. What did life mean to a fool? What did it mean to him? Brennan’s days had been full of death; brutal, sometimes barbaric death – as he looked around this slim section of the public, he questioned the worth of his occupation. Would any of these drones miss what they had if it was suddenly wrung out of them? If their precious life was snuffed out – what difference would it make to the world to lose one more of these lifeless cabbages?
Brennan shook himself. It was a pathetic indulgence that he had allowed himself: weighing the value of a life. Who was he, God? He knew it meant nothing – no more than the flip remark that death comes to us all. It was a stupid indulgence and he understood that, regretted it at once.
The victim was only one half of the equation – the perpetrator was the other. Any notion that the victim had to be of an exalted value to the human race missed the point. It was the act, not the consequence Brennan knew he had to concern himself with now. It was the cold cruelty. The malevolence. The evil. That’s what fired him. No matter how indifferent he was to the mass of men and their lives of quiet desperation, he could not conceive of killing anyone himself; it took another type of man to do that – the type he had sworn to protect all others from.
‘Black coffee,’ the woman on the counter shouted out.
‘Yeah, mine. Thanks.’
Brennan took it, held it steady as he returned to the car. He opened the door, stepped in behind the wheel. A little coffee escaped from the brim of the Styrofoam cup, slid down the side and scalded his fingers.
‘Shit.’
He quickly swapped the cup into his other hand, pulled out the holder on the dash and slotted the coffee cup in it. The DI exhaled deeply, gathered himself for a moment, then tugged over his seatbelt and drove off.
At the edge of Princes Street, the tram works – that eternal gutting of the city – had diverted traffic up Lothian Road in a snaking one-way system. There were new temporary traffic lights in operation. He couldn’t keep up with the changes in the city’s road layouts. There was a burning, sneaking assumption lurking in him that said the council was orchestrating this as a revenge for the public’s rejection of its congestion charge.
Brennan banged on the rim of the wheel, said, ‘Come on for fuck’s sake.’
The traffic was stationary. He had a full view of a tram – immobile – that had been installed at the foot of the Castle, on the main shopping thoroughfare. The idea was to give the city a taste of things to come; Brennan knew there would be snowballs in hell before a single tram got rolling. He readied himself to curse again as the light changed; he engaged the clutch and geared the car forward.
‘About bloody time.’
On Queensferry Street, Brennan removed a cigarette from his packet of Embassy Regal; he had reached the point where he didn’t care about giving up now. He had once tried to cut back, tried smoking milder brands, but now he was so entrenched in his own form of personal nihilism that he had abandoned the idea. He pressed the lighter in the dash and waited for the ping.
By Fettes, Brennan had smoked three-quarters of the cigarette and his coffee was now cool enough to drink. He stubbed the dowp on the tarmac and walked with his coffee cup held out in front of him. The door was opened by a waiting uniform. He nodded a thank you.
Inside, the desk sergeant greeted him. ‘Morning, Rob.’
More nods, the standard greeting. ‘Doesn’t feel like morning.’
‘You were on the early start out at Straiton … Saw it on the lunchtime news.’
‘Aye, so did I.’
‘You don’t sound chuffed.’
‘Would you be, Charlie.’ It wasn’t a question. More of a statement to confirm his position.
The older man leaned forward; the bright lights above the desk caught on his pate and momentarily blinded Brennan. ‘The Chief Super’s been running around like he’s got a bee in his bonnet.’
‘Really?’
A look to the left, a tweak of the nose. ‘I keep expecting the wee baldy fella to show up and Benny to start slapping his head!’
Brennan permitted himself a laugh. Chief Superintendent Bernard Hill had only been in the station a few months and had already earned himself the moniker Benny.
‘I better get up there … Though I suspect it’ll be no joke.’
Charlie pinched his lips like he was about to whistle, rested his chin on his knuckles. ‘Aye, well … He’s already pulled the station roster, counting the overtime up, that’ll be down to you, no doubt.’
Brennan dipped his head. He felt the blood stiffen in his veins. He had a murderer to catch, he didn’t need to have his every move costed and budgeted. He turned for the stairs. On the way up he passed a young WPC, she was carrying a blue folder and tried not to catch the officer’s attention; he remembered what it was like to be her age, at her stage on the career path, and afraid of senior officers. At that stage, Brennan had wanted to ascend the ranks, purely so he could be the one giving the orders. Was it just ego? he thought. Had his ego pushed him to this point?
At the top of the stairs Brennan took a sip from his coffee cup. He glanced down the corridor towards the Chief Super’s office; he was in, his secretary was sitting by the door typing up some no doubt important piece of documentation, like an RSVP to the Provost’s latest black-tie event. Brennan stared for a moment longer, he thought about the short distance that the Chief Super’s office was from his own and whether it was a distance he wanted to, or indeed ever would, cover. He had once spoken to Wullie about why he had never progressed beyond DI and the old boy understood intuitively where he was coming from. ‘You’re too smart to go chasing rank, Rob … You know already that, up or down, the ladder’s shaky, son,’
he had said. Brennan had a smile to himself as he thought of Wullie, he missed him around the place. There were far too many careerists and glory hunters on the scene now.
As he turned to face Incident Room One, Brennan heard his name called from the other end of the corridor. He glanced over his shoulder but already he knew the voice belonged to Benny.
‘A minute, please, Rob.’ The Chief Super stood in his doorway, buttoned up, spick and span as ever.
Brennan stared at him for a second or two, took in his worth. Hill was about the same age as he was, but he was shorter. The Chief Super had a weaker frame and he wore glasses; he didn’t look the type to go far in frontline policing. He leaned over his secretary’s desk, removed his glasses for a moment, then ushered Brennan like a toreador, ‘Well, come along.’
‘Coming.’ The DI nodded, started a slow trail towards his superior’s outer-office door. Once inside he closed the door gently, nodded and smiled towards Dee the secretary, and proceeded to the door marked BERNARD HILL, CHIEF SUPERINTENDENT.
‘Take a seat, Rob.’
‘Is it going to take that long? … I have a murder investigation on the go.’
The Chief Super returned his glasses to his nose, it was a delicate bulb nose and looked to be rimmed in red, like he had been battling a cold for too long. He indicated the seat with the flat of his hand. ‘Please.’
Brennan obliged him, pulled out the chair and lowered himself onto it.
‘I wanted to grab you before you went through … There’s been some developments.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Brennan felt himself shift his weight in the chair. ‘What would they be?’
‘We have ID’d the victim.’
Brennan tensed up, ‘What? … When did this come in?’
‘Look, calm down … It’s just in this minute, I’m literally just off the phone to the lab, I was on my way to call you.’
Brennan’s stock of anger subsided a little, ‘Well … Are you going to fill me in? I am the investigating officer.’
The Chief Super peered over his glasses at Brennan, his eyes were damp and red-webbed but the look was a definite warning. ‘Well, we cross-matched the victim’s dental records from those on the missing persons list, locally that is, there weren’t so many – we got a lucky break …’
Brennan felt himself gripping the arm of the chair tightly. ‘Really, lucky for who, sir?’
‘Well, not the young girl. Or her family … Which reminds me, would you, eh …’
Brennan nodded. ‘Consider it done.’
‘Good. Good. Her name is Lindsey Sloan, like I say, a local girl … There’s a file obviously.’ The Chief Super removed a blue folder from the top of a pile on his desk and handed it to Brennan. It seemed a slim volume to contain the details of a life that had ended; it would be added to now though, in minute detail. It struck him that most victims attracted more attention in death than they ever did in life; the thought gored him.
‘I’ll alert the parents.’
Brennan rose.
‘Oh, if you don’t mind …’ The Chief Super indicated the chair again. ‘I’m not finished.’
‘No?’
‘No, I’m not. I wanted to ask if you’d seen this?’
He passed a sheet of paper over the desk towards Brennan, who turned it around, scanned the rubric. It was the memorandum about the complete ban on overtime. Brennan took a deep breath and stared out of the window; he caught sight of a road sweeper leaning on his broom.
‘Well, you did see this?’
‘Yes.’
‘And?’
‘And, what, sir?’
The Chief Super looked perplexed, he removed his glasses again, started to fumble for words. He tapped a pile of papers on the other side of the desk. ‘This is the duty roster, it’s what we are budgeted for this month.’ He picked up another pile of papers, ‘And this is what has been added to it from your little escapade last night … Where am I supposed to find the savings?’
Brennan rolled his eyes towards his feet. ‘I think that’s an administrative issue, sir … As I said, I’m running a murder investigation.’
The Chief Super gasped, his neck seemed to shorten as he threw himself back in his chair. ‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this. Do you read the papers?’
‘Yes, full of crime, sir.’
‘I was referring to the recession … The country is in dire straits in case you haven’t noticed, and we are public servants, we have to do our bit. Do we understand each other?’
When he was younger, Brennan knew, he would have flared up after a remark like that. But not now. For some time he had come to the conclusion that life was an endless succession of such blows. Wullie had called it ‘eating crow’. Brennan knew the bird was a staple of every man’s diet, and it was a measure of the man how much he could consume without reacting.
He answered, ‘I think we understand each other, sir.’ His heart beat faster now, he felt it pounding beneath his shirt front, but his chest cavity felt strangely empty. He was trapped, but he knew it was futile to struggle in the trap. It only made things worse, made the job more difficult for you.
The Chief Super painted a thin smirk on his face, ‘Good, I’m glad we understand each other. Because any further misunderstandings will have very serious consequences, Inspector.’
Chapter 7
BRENNAN KNEW THAT life was never going to be easy for him. For some it was. For the brutes whose only aim was to get snout to trough, life was simple, a joy even. For the thinking, the intelligent, it was a complex affair. He recalled an interrogation of a repeat offender – a gangly youth he’d watched grow into a stocky recidivist – who said he’d been in trouble his whole life because he ‘just had one of those faces’. Brennan knew he had one of those faces too; but there was more. There was something inside him – an energy he was dimly aware of. He would often feel it rise in him, force him to rebel, and even when he held it in check – ignored it, sublimated it – it was still there. It shone out of him, it showed in his face, and the brutes scented it like pack dogs detecting adrenaline before an attack.
Brennan had tried to deny his self, who he was inside – to have an easy life – but it didn’t work. It merely weakened him, his energy attenuated. Denial of his true self only brought in doubts, and ultimately lowered the innate respect he had for himself. By the age he was now, Brennan knew he should have accepted his lot. Both physically and spiritually – he was what he was. There was no point fighting it, denying himself. But he sometimes longed for an easier path from birth to death – how could he not when the ignorant brutes had it so good?
He felt controlled like a marionette on strings. Life was all about control – who had it, who controlled whom – it dictated the level of your contentment and happiness. If you were a controller, the world felt like it was yours, even a small world. But if you were controlled, even a little, you were nothing but someone’s plaything. Brennan had sometimes wondered about leaving the force, the city, hauling up somewhere alien to him. Somewhere where no one knew him, where he could be free, untrammelled. But it was only a dream. There was no escape from his lot and he knew it. The inner scream could rage, roar louder, but it had to be suppressed. Exhibiting doubts was a weakness, and if they saw weakness on the force, it made their control of you even stronger.
The door’s hinges wheezed as Brennan entered Incident Room One. At once heads turned in his direction: he managed to ignore them for his first few steps but when Lou and Brian turned round to greet him in unison, the DI halted. He saw McGuire down the other end of the room at the whiteboard with Elaine Docherty, one of the WPCs; they seemed to be very close but separated instantly as they caught sight of Brennan; he tipped back his head to beckon McGuire over.
‘Right, listen up.’
The room stilled. A few rose from chairs, others eased themselves onto the corners of desks. Files and coffee cups were put down.
‘There have been some developments in the last few minutes
…’ The silence was interrupted by a cackle of low voices. Brennan raised his own voice, ‘We have a name for our victim. She is a local girl and was on the missing persons’ list so we tied the dental together pretty quickly.’
‘What’s her name, boss?’
Brennan turned over the blue folder in his hand, opened up. He was surprised to see a colour photograph of a smiling young girl; she looked nothing like the bloodless corpse he’d seen a few hours ago. ‘Her name is Lindsey Sloan, I’ll be giving the details over to Stevie and he can fill you in …’ Brennan leaned forward, passed the folder to the DS.
‘Have the parents been notified?’ said McGuire.
Brennan shook his head, ‘That’s a job for you and me this afternoon, Stevie.’
‘I can hardly wait.’
The DI continued his impromptu briefing. ‘Now, I don’t need to tell you that the scene of the crime was particularly gruesome. Let there be no doubt in anyone’s mind that we are dealing with a seriously deranged killer …’ Brennan spotted the far entrance door to the room open, DI Jim Gallagher sauntered in and pulled out a chair; as he sat he swept a hand over his thick-set jowls. He was not part of the squad; Brennan eyed him down the length of the room, ‘Something for us, Jim?’
Headshakes, a smoker’s cough into a fist. ‘No, just passing through. Carry on …’
Brennan ignored the interruption, ‘Right, what’s everyone got for me?’
Lou was first to speak, ‘Well, everything’s up in the air now that we have an ID, surely.’
‘Nothing come out the field?’
‘Cow shit, sir,’ said Collins.
‘That it?’
‘Not a mark; there’s some footprints but they’re looking like the kid’s …’ He turned over a page in his notebook, ‘Er, Ben Russell.’
‘What’s he had to say for himself?’ said Brennan.
Collins deferred to McGuire.
A shrug, ‘Not much, they were out clubbing, he stopped for a pish, found the victim. He’s a student, the whole lot from the car were, I don’t think they’ve got a parking ticket between them.’
