The Innocent and the Dead

by Robert McNeill

  THE INNOCENT

  AND THE DEAD

  The DI Jack Knox mysteries Book 1

  ROBERT McNEILL

  Including the Prequel:

  THE LABYRINTH

  Published by

  THE BOOK FOLKS

  London, 2019

  © Robert McNeill

  Polite note to the reader

  This book is written in British English except where fidelity to other languages or accents is appropriate.

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  We hope you enjoy the book.

  Table of Contents

  THE LABYRINTH

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  THE INNOCENT AND THE DEAD

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  More fiction by Robert McNeill

  Other titles of interest

  FREE BOOKS IN YOUR INBOX

  THE LABYRINTH

  A prequel to the DI Jack Knox mysteries

  Chapter One

  Detective Inspector Jack Knox followed the path from the car park to where the body lay. The young woman was positioned face-up near a thicket of bushes at right-angles to the walkway. Portable spotlights illuminated the scene, and Knox saw the victim’s blue pleated skirt had been hitched up to her hips and her knickers pulled to her ankles. A Scottish Police Authority forensics officer in protective clothing was on his knees examining the area near the body with a UV lamp.

  ‘Find anything, Ed?’ Knox asked.

  DI Edward Murray turned and registered Knox’s presence. He shook his head. ‘Nothing significant so far, Jack. A couple of cigarette ends and a condom. Found them further back. Don’t think they’re connected with the deceased, though.’

  ‘Pathologist been?’

  ‘Yeah, Mr Turley. You just missed him.’ Murray indicated the dead woman. ‘Video and photography’s been done. She’ll be taken to the Cowgate Mortuary within the hour and we’ll tent the area for a more detailed examination. Turley says cause of death was asphyxiation due to strangulation. Estimates time of death at around 11pm. He’ll do a full post-mortem later and confirm.’

  Knox looked at his watch. ‘So, just under two hours ago. We got a name yet?’

  Murray stood up and nodded to a uniformed constable standing nearby. ‘PC Gray was first on the scene,’ he replied. ‘Found her handbag lying on the path near the car park. Her driving licence was inside and the photo checks out. Identifies her as Elizabeth O’Brian, aged twenty-seven.’

  ‘Thanks, Ed,’ Knox said.

  Knox went over to Gray, who was standing next to the barrier tape on the downward slope of the path. ‘PC Gray?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Mr Murray tells me you were the first to arrive.’

  ‘Yes, sir. PC Dave Kinghorn and I were in Greenside Place when the call came in.’ Gray pointed to steps further down the path. ‘The man who found the body is with PC Kinghorn. The car’s at the Regent Road exit.’

  ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘McGilvery, sir. Ronald McGilvery.’

  ‘Fine. Radio Kinghorn, will you, Gray? Ask him to bring Mr McGilvery to the car park at the top. I’ll be with the Mobile Incident Unit. It was being set up as I drove in.’

  Gray reached for his radio. ‘Sir,’ he replied.

  Knox felt slightly out of breath as he walked back to the top of Calton Hill. He realised that in a few hours, tourists would be disappointed at being turned away from one of Edinburgh’s most favoured attractions. He’d read somewhere that Calton Hill, with its panoramic views and iconic monuments, was almost as popular as Edinburgh Castle in terms of visitor numbers. Knox had driven past the largest of these, the National Monument, on the vehicle access road. He’d then parked facing the Nelson Monument, a hundred-foot tower erected to the fallen of the Napoleonic Wars.

  Now he gained the top after passing a third structure, an observatory designed by William Playfair. As Knox reached the car park, the driver of a Ford Mondeo saw him and flashed his headlights.

  Detective Sergeant Bill Fulton was heavy-built and in his early fifties, and had partnered Knox for almost three years. He got out of the car and pressed the key; the indicators flashed as the car’s remote locking activated.

  Fulton thumbed in the direction of the monument behind him. ‘Edinburgh’s Disgrace,’ he said.

  ‘What is?’ Knox asked.

  ‘The National Monument,’ Fulton replied. ‘Wasn’t completed, so it’s known locally as Edinburgh’s Disgrace. Apparently, when they put it up in the early 1800s, it was intended to be a copy of the Parthenon in Athens. Story is the bigwigs couldn’t get the funds to finish the job; raised only sixteen of the forty-two grand needed. These twelve columns were all that were built before the project was kicked into touch.’

  ‘You’re a fund of local knowledge, Bill.’

  Fulton grinned. ‘Just thought as a Borderer you mightn’t know, boss.’

  At that moment, a marked police car drove into the car park and stopped beside Fulton’s Mondeo. The constable driving got out together with his passenger, a tall man in his early thirties.

  ‘That’ll be McGilvery,’ Knox told Fulton. ‘The man who found her. We’ll interview him in the MIU.’

  * * *

  ‘I thought it was a bundle of old clothes at first,’ McGilvery said. He was sitting at a Formica-topped table in a room at the rear of the Mobile Incident Unit a few minutes later. Knox and Fulton sat opposite. There were three coffees in Styrofoam cups in front of them, which Fulton had brought from a vending machine at the front of the trailer.

  ‘When I got nearer, I realised it was a woman,’ McGilvery continued. ‘I went over – not right up to her, you understand – but I’d an idea she was dead. Then I called 999.’

  ‘That was just after twelve?’ Knox asked.

  ‘I’m not sure exactly,’ McGilvery replied.

  ‘That’s the time your call was logged,’ Knox said.

  ‘Oh. Yeah, it must’ve been then.’

  ‘Do you mind telling us what you were doing up here so late?’ Fulton asked.

  A sheen of sweat had formed on McGilvery’s forehead. ‘I... I was just taking a walk. I’d been at the Taj Mahal club. You know, on Royal Terrace?’

  ‘Yes, go on,’ Fulton said.

  ‘I often drop in at the weekends. Play a few hands of blackjack, have a couple of drinks. Anyway, I lost more than I intended and was a bit worse for wear. I decided to take a walk up here and clear my head.’

  ‘You were cruising, weren’t you, Ronald?’ Knox asked. After dark, Calton Hill was known to be a favourite meeting place for gay men. Knox thought this the real reason McGilvery was there.

  ‘Sorry, I don’t understand,’ McGilvery replied.

  ‘You’re
gay, aren’t you?’ Knox said.

  ‘I’m married,’ McGilvery replied.

  Knox said nothing. For a long moment, both he and Fulton stared directly at McGilvery.

  ‘Okay, okay.’ He looked at Knox. ‘You’ll not say anything, will you? My wife knows nothing about–’

  Knox cut in. ‘Your sexual orientation’s your own business, Ronald. I’m asking only to establish a reason for your being here.’

  McGilvery studied Knox for a second or two, then nodded.

  ‘So,’ Knox continued, ‘when did you get here?’

  ‘Must’ve been around midnight.’

  ‘What time did you leave the Taj Mahal?’

  ‘Five or ten minutes before that, I think.’ McGilvery straightened, his chair creaking. ‘About ten to twelve.’

  ‘You used the steps on the Royal Terrace side?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You didn’t see the body on the way up?’

  McGilvery shook his head. ‘No, there’s a path from the steps that ends behind the observatory.’

  Knox nodded. ‘Anyone else on the hill when you arrived?’

  ‘Nobody that I saw. I walked to the other side of the–’ McGilvery paused and gave the detectives a questioning look ‘–the tower?’

  ‘The Nelson Monument,’ Fulton said.

  McGilvery nodded. ‘Yeah. Some nice views from there.’

  Knox said, ‘Uh-huh. What happened then?’

  ‘I waited a wee while, decided to walk down to Regent Road to hail a taxi.’ McGilvery pursed his lips, then added, ‘That’s when I saw her.’

  ‘Right, Ronald,’ Knox said, looking at his notes. ‘You can go. PC Kinghorn has your details. I’ll ask him to give you a lift down to Princes Street and you can hail a cab from there. We’ll be in touch if we need to speak to you again.’

  * * *

  ‘So, what do you think, boss?’ Fulton said as PC Kinghorn drove off a few minutes later. ‘McGilvery know more than he’s saying?’

  Knox turned up his jacket collar to counter a stiff breeze. ‘Seemed a bit vague on when he discovered the body, yet was fairly sure of the time he left the Taj Mahal.’

  ‘Significant, you think?’

  ‘Probably not. Still, we’ll make sure he’s a member and see if anyone can vouch for when he left.’

  At that moment, Knox’s mobile rang. He tapped the Answer button and said, ‘DI Knox.’

  ‘It’s Alex Turley, Jack. The SPA forensics team have just brought in the deceased. They tell me you’re still in the area. I’ll be carrying out the PM in around twenty minutes if you care to come down.’

  Knox looked at his watch. ‘I’ll be there in ten, Alex. Thanks for letting me know.’

  He ended the call and turned to Fulton. ‘That was Turley, Bill. I’ll drive down to the Cowgate and get his update. Shouldn’t take more than a half hour. I’ll get on to the station, make sure you’re relieved by two so you’re able to grab a few hours’ kip. See you at Gayfield Square around nine. We can take it from there.’

  Fulton nodded. ‘Sounds fine to me, boss.’

  Chapter Two

  As Knox steered his VW Passat from Princes Street onto Waverley Bridge, he marvelled at the number of people still up and about. It was the last Saturday in June, a time when the number of tourists in the city was almost at its highest.

  There were any number of restaurants and clubs open, of course, where visitors and locals alike were able to revel into the wee hours. Knox reflected that only the Edinburgh International Festival in August would see a bigger influx, when the population of the city virtually doubled overnight.

  He continued into the Old Town, crossing the Royal Mile into St Mary’s Street, then turned right at the next set of traffic lights.

  The City Mortuary was situated a hundred or so yards along on his left, a nondescript concrete box built in the late 1960s and set back from the road. Knox parked the Passat and walked up a short lane to the entrance where he was buzzed inside.

  He was met by Turley, a stocky, bearded man in his late forties. He led Knox to an ante-room, where the detective took off his jacket and put on a green gown. Knox then followed the pathologist into the main post-mortem theatre.

  A fixed steel table occupied the centre of the room, on which Elizabeth O’Brian’s body lay covered with a white plastic sheet.

  Although no stranger to the examination room, its cold, sterile environment never failed to assail Knox’s senses: the floor-to-ceiling tiles and overwhelming smell of disinfectant; the drain runnels and coiled hose attached to a tap ready for flushing; the glass-fronted cabinet with its array of surgical implements; and the steady hum of refrigeration from rows of numbered drawers where the corpses were stored.

  Turley went to the table and uncovered the body, pulling the sheet to the woman’s midriff. ‘I’ve completed my preliminary examination, Jack,’ he said, ‘and can tell you that there are no recent signs of sexual intercourse. For this reason, I’d say that although the deceased’s underwear was pulled to her ankles, she wasn’t raped.’

  ‘Really?’ Knox said. ‘I expected her to have been sexually assaulted.’

  ‘Perhaps someone disturbed the perpetrator?’ Turley paused and shook his head. ‘Of course, there’s another possibility.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘A deliberate attempt to debase the deceased. Although in many such cases the victim is found with her legs spread-eagled. Not so here.’

  Knox nodded.

  ‘Anyway, as I mentioned to DI Murray at the locus,’ Turley continued, ‘I believe the cause of death to be asphyxiation due to strangulation, which occurred around 11pm, give or take fifteen minutes.’ He moved to the top of the table and pointed to O’Brian’s neck. ‘You see this purple-blue line at her throat’ – Turley turned to Knox, who nodded again – ‘this is where some kind of ligature was passed around her neck.’ The pathologist moved his finger to O’Brian’s face. ‘And see here, these tiny haemorrhages on her face and eyes. They’re called petechiae. I’ve no doubt when I carry out a full dissection, I’ll see fractures of the laryngeal cartilage, which will prove beyond doubt that strangulation was the cause of death.’

  Turley moved his finger back to the throat. ‘But there’s another thing that’s interesting. The pressure formed by the ligature isn’t uniform all the way around. Here’ – he indicated the area immediately below O’Brian’s left ear – ‘there’s a deeper indentation, more round in shape, both above and below where the ligature was applied.’

  Knox saw a distinct purple-black oval impressed deeper into the skin at the point Turley indicated. ‘Yes, I see. What do you think caused it?’

  Turley straightened up and stood back. ‘I’d say the killer had a ring on one of his fingers. As he tightened the ligature, he most likely pressed his fist into her neck, which caused the indentation.’

  The pathologist pulled the covering sheet to the foot of the table, then turned to a trolley containing a range of surgical implements. He selected a large scalpel and placed the point just under O’Brian’s left breast, then turned to Knox and said, ‘I’ll commence a full autopsy right away.’ He grinned and added, ‘You’ll probably not want to stay?’ Turley knew that although Knox had witnessed a fair number of corpses being dissected, it was his least favourite part of the proceedings.

  Knox smiled. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m happy to leave the remainder of the PM in your capable hands.’

  ‘Fair enough, Jack.’ Turley paused and pointed to a sheet of paper on top of the cabinet. ‘Oh, by the way – the SPA lads have tagged and bagged her belongings, which are away for forensics. They left you a list.’

  Knox took the note and examined it for a moment. ‘Odd. No mobile phone.’

  ‘That’s everything she had with her.’

  Knox nodded, then pocketed the note and went to the door. ‘Thanks, Alex,’ he said. ‘Speak to you later.’

  * * *

  As Knox left the building and approached
his car, he heard a noise across the street, then turned and saw two men at the edge of the pavement opposite. The taller of the pair called over, his voice slurred. ‘Spare a fag, pal?’

  Knox activated the Passat’s central locking and opened the car door. ‘Sorry, I don’t smoke,’ he said.

  The man’s shorter and more muscular-looking companion stepped onto the road and began to saunter towards Knox. ‘How about lettin’ us have the price of a packet, then?’

  The taller man guffawed. ‘Aye, right, Davy. Looks like he’s not short of a bob or two.’

  Knox shook his head. ‘Come on, lads, enough. Be on your way.’

  Davy’s face suddenly twisted with rage. He took a flick knife from his pocket and triggered the blade. ‘Who the fuck’re ye talkin’ to?’ he said, thrusting the knife at Knox.

  In one swift movement, Knox sidestepped left, grabbed his attacker’s wrist, then yanked it up behind his back until there was a distinct snap. Davy immediately released the blade and shrieked with pain. ‘Ya bastard,’ he yelled, ‘you’ve broken my arm.’

  Meanwhile his cohort saw the weapon fall and crouched to pick it up. But his move came too late; Knox released Davy and delivered a swift kick to the man’s shin, causing him to drop to his knees.

  Knox leaned into the car and took a set of handcuffs from the door pocket. He pressed one cuff against Davy’s wrist and snapped it closed, then repeated the action with the other cuff on the wrist of his accomplice.

  He took out his warrant card and flashed it in his assailants’ faces. ‘Police,’ he said. ‘The two of you are under arrest. Attempted robbery and assault on an officer of the law.’

  The tall man glanced at his companion and gave a loud groan. ‘Aw, naw, Davy,’ he said. ‘Why’d you have to go and pick on a fuckin’ cop?’

  * * *

  Bill Fulton was sitting at his desk when Knox arrived at Gayfield Square Police Station a little after nine. On Knox’s approach, he looked up and smiled. ‘Hear you ran into some trouble earlier, boss.’