The Roots of Evil (Bob Skinner)

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘You’re right, Mr Francis,’ the DI agreed. ‘I’m not going to tell you. Now, I’d like you to step outside and wait in the hall, in case we need you again.’

  ‘Oh, you will, trust me. I’ll be here. The main room’s straight ahead.’

  The two detectives slipped on paper overshoes and gloves, then followed his direction into the apartment’s spacious reception area.

  The Water of Leith meandered under the window, making its way towards the port from which it took its name. Its level was high after the heavy rainfall of the previous days, but it was still well short of being a torrent. Broken twigs, vegetation and the inevitable single-use plastic were carried by on its surface, drawing a grunt of disapproval from Detective Sergeant Tarvil Singh.

  ‘Folk that do that should be in fucking jail,’ he growled.

  ‘What?’ Haddock asked.

  ‘Chucking milk bottles in the Water of Leith.’

  The DI smiled at his righteous indignation. ‘The prisons wouldn’t be big enough.’

  ‘Maybe we could reintroduce transportation to Australia. There must be enough space, going by the number of Aussies working in pubs around here.’

  ‘Come away from the window, Tarvil,’ Haddock said. ‘You’re like an eclipse of the sun standing there.’

  The massive Sikh obeyed. ‘What are we looking for here, Sauce?’ he asked.

  ‘When we find it, we’ll know. Anything that will connect Griff and Terry Coats. Anything that will tell us where they might have been last night when they were killed. We’ve been through Griff’s work diary, and through his whole office computer. There was nothing on it that wasn’t police business.’

  ‘Last night?’ Singh repeated. ‘How do we know for sure when they were killed?’

  ‘Emily Badger, the pathologist, was confident that they died not long before the bodies were dumped. They were still warm and there was no sign of rigor when she examined them. So far, the forensic team haven’t found anything that gives us a clue to where they were shot, but it’s early days for them. One question I need to answer is, why was Griff here at all? He was signed off on leave from last Friday night until a week on Monday, and he told Sally McGlashan, the South East area commander, that he was going to South Africa to visit his sister and Mary Chambers, and to catch up with his kids.’

  ‘But did he say when?’

  ‘Yes. He told her he’d a flight booked on Saturday night.’

  ‘It’s Wednesday now. Could he have been there and back?’

  ‘In theory yes, but would you go to the southern hemisphere at the end of December for just a couple of days? Jackie Wright’s in the office already; I’ve asked her to check whether he actually had a flight booked. I’ve decided to run the inquiry out of Fettes rather than Torphichen Place. It’s logical; that’s our base and we’ve got more facilities there.’ He paused, looking around the room, frowning. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said softly. ‘It’s cold in here, Tarvil, isn’t it? I’ve still got my coat on but it’s freezing.’

  ‘Now you mention it . . .’ the DS agreed.

  Haddock stepped back into the hallway, where he had noticed a thermostat. ‘This is set to ten centigrade,’ he called out. ‘It’s a holiday setting, just to make sure nothing freezes. That’s consistent with what he told Chief Inspector McGlashan. And yet he was still in Edinburgh. How come?’ He re-joined Singh. ‘Another mystery, but let’s get started, see what this place tells us.’

  Together they opened each drawer and cupboard in the living area, emptying each one out. They found nothing but table linen, place mats and crockery, everything in order, everything arranged logically. Similarly, the drinks cabinet contained nothing more than a range of liqueurs and glasses, and a cocktail shaker.

  ‘Kitchen?’ the DS suggested. ‘You can read the book of my life in mine. Everything gets stuck in a clip behind the door.’

  Haddock grinned and nodded. ‘With us, it’s a jar. Let’s have a look, but this room’s just like his office, im-fucking-peccable. If that’s the same . . .’

  The kitchen was a galley shape. The sink was below the window, which also overlooked the river; there was a combined washer dryer and a dishwasher plumbed in beneath. The wall above the work surface was fitted with cupboards for the length of the space until they reached a large fridge freezer. Above a chopping block, next to the hobs, an array of knives hung on a magnetic strip. But there was no clip behind the door, no credit card receipts in a jar, no visible evidence of occupation.

  ‘This could be a show flat,’ Singh observed, contradicting himself as he opened the fridge to find butter, cheese, an unopened carton of orange juice, half a dozen bottles of Peroni, and on a rack, a bottle of Prosecco and two of a white wine with a distinctive label. ‘No milk,’ he said.

  ‘Let’s see those.’ Haddock stepped alongside him and took one of the wine bottles from the rack. He examined the label. ‘Chateau Vartely,’ he murmured.

  ‘Aye?’

  ‘Moldovan, Tarvil. It’s unusual; I only recognise it because somebody gave me a bottle for Christmas. It was at the Fettes party. I took it home and stuck it under the tree, but the label fell off, so I don’t know who it was from.’

  They searched the cupboards one by one, finding nothing other than tinned and packaged food, more crockery and utensils. They were about to move on when Haddock glanced at the washer dryer. ‘He’s forgotten to empty it,’ he said, pulling the door open and removing the contents, in a bundle. He selected an item and held it up. ‘Tommy Hilfiger shirt.’ He tossed it back in the pile and chose another. ‘Armani boxers. Wouldn’t you . . . Eh?’ He spotted two other garments and held them up, peering at the labels. ‘Frilly knickers, black. One matching bra, thirty-eight C cup. I doubt that these were Griff’s.’

  ‘No, wrong size,’ Singh growled.

  ‘That and they’re Marks and Spencer.’

  ‘Do you reckon they’re Alex Skinner’s?’

  The DI gazed at him, unsmiling. ‘It won’t be me that asks her,’ he said. ‘Come on, let’s look in the bedrooms.’

  They returned to the hall, where they saw four doors. Closest to the entrance was a cupboard that contained the heating boiler and other standard items, including an iron and board and a Dyson vacuum cleaner. Top of the range, Haddock noted mentally. They moved on to the bathroom, finding nothing in it other than two towels on a rail and soap in a dispenser.

  The third door was secured by a circular Yale lock. ‘I’ll get Mr Francis back in,’ the DS said.

  ‘Let’s check the bedroom first. I guess it must be Griff’s.’

  It was an en-suite, again with a river view. The wardrobes were fitted to make the most of limited space, and the bed was king size. It had a printed duvet, avoiding the need for a cover; its pattern was a version of the South African flag. Singh opened a pair of double wardrobe doors, looked in, and began to examine the contents. It contained ten shirts by Pink on hangers, four suits, two of them with the labels of a private tailor, three casual jackets, one of them in supple tan leather, four pairs of trousers, hung upside down, a white tuxedo and a heavy winter overcoat. Two further hangers and a trouser clip were unused, side by side on the rail. Beyond them were a pair of denims, ladies’ size, and a grey midi dress.

  ‘Our man Griff had a fair clothing budget.’

  ‘That bears out what we found in his office locker,’ Haddock confirmed. He took the denims from the rail and held them up. ‘M and S again. You can forget them being Alex’s. They’re too short; she’s at least five nine. We have to go over everything again, Tarvil. We need to find this woman, whoever she is.’

  ‘Is there a bar code on those jeans? On the label?’

  ‘Good call,’ Haddock muttered, examining the garment. He found what he was looking for beneath the washing instructions, took a photograph and sent it to DC Jackie Wright, with a message. ‘Check if we can establish from this where this garment was sold. If possible, see if we can link it to a card payment. I need to know t
he buyer; it’ll be a woman.’

  The next wardrobe contained open shelves, stacked with socks, boxers, neatly folded casual shirts, and a few female undergarments including nylon tights, still in their wrapping. ‘She wasn’t a live-in, whoever his woman was,’ the DI murmured. ‘Does the bathroom tell us anything?’ he called out to Singh, who had moved into the en-suite.

  ‘It tells us what the empty hangers in the wardrobe do,’ the sergeant boomed, ‘that he had left for a trip. There’s no shaving gear, or deodorant, or aftershave. However,’ he continued, lowering his voice as he re-joined his colleague, ‘there’s these.’ He held up, between his gloved fingers, a pink toothbrush and a small black cylinder. ‘There’s no toothpaste, so I’m assuming that Griff took it, and his own toothbrush, and that this is hers. As is the lipstick. We might get prints off them.’

  ‘We’ll get prints off the whole fucking flat,’ Haddock pointed out, ‘and if she’s on file we’ll trace her, but good thinking nonetheless.’

  ‘Not just a pretty face.’

  ‘Not even. Let’s check the last room.’

  They summoned the locksmith; he was smiling. ‘I told you that you’d need me again.’

  ‘Can you get in?’ the DI asked.

  ‘It’s my job,’ he replied. ‘If my customers lose their keys, and it happens, they come to me for replacements. You cannae just walk into a shop and have one done. This looks like any other Yale but it’s not.’ He stepped up to the door, selected a key from a ring and opened it. ‘This is his office,’ he announced.

  The room was smaller than the others. The window had a Venetian blind but the slats were open far enough for them to see that it faced downriver, rather than overlooking it. There was a wall-mounted TV, a small sofa, and a Cyrus music system that Singh, an enthusiast, knew must have cost at least two thousand pounds, but the space was dominated by a fitted workstation, with the same facing as the bedroom units, that housed a twenty-seven-inch iMac.

  Haddock touched the computer. ‘We need to get into that.’ He glanced at Mr Francis. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got his password as well?’

  ‘Naw, you’re on your own there,’ he paused, ‘but you’ll need to get into this too.’ He stepped past the detectives and opened a door in the workstation, revealing a safe. ‘I don’t have the combination for this boy either . . . but you can get in with a key in an emergency, if you know where to find the keyhole.’

  He knelt, awkwardly, because he was a bulky man, sorted through his keyring once again, then rolled the maker’s name upwards, revealing a slot. ‘You find the odd idiot who’ll burn out a dozen drill bits trying to get into one of those things,’ there was a click and the safe swung open, ‘but this is all you have to do.’ He pushed himself to his feet. ‘I’ll leave you to it again. Is that me done?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ the DI said, ‘if you leave us the keys you used.’

  ‘Mmm.’ Doubt showed on his face. ‘I don’t know about that. Mr Montell won’t be very pleased when he comes back. Does your warrant mean that I have to?’

  ‘No, it doesn’t, but that’s irrelevant. Mr Montell won’t be coming back, Mr Francis, because he’s dead, but not a word of that outside this building, and not a word about what went on here. Understood?’

  The locksmith nodded. ‘Aye, no worries. I value the work I get from the police. Okay, you can have the keys.’

  ‘That’s good. Just one more thing before you go. When did you fit all this stuff?’

  ‘Two years ago; this was a bedroom before. Gimme time and I can give you the date that I done it.’

  ‘It must have cost a bit.’

  ‘Oh yes.’ He grinned. ‘A fair few grand, with all the bits and installation. I shouldnae tell you this, ken, but I gave him a discount for cash. I’d still love to know what he did, but I don’t suppose you’re goin’ tae tell me.’

  ‘I can’t do that, but thanks for your help. Enjoy the rest of your day.’

  Mr Francis unwound three keys from his selection and left, closing the front door behind him.

  As soon as he was gone, Haddock dropped to his knees in front of the safe and looked inside. It contained a thick brown envelope, a plastic food container, and on a shelf near the top, two watch boxes and a cloth bundle, all of which he removed. Branding on the boxes showed that one was a Rolex and the other a Breitling. The former was empty, but the latter contained a steel and gold timepiece with a jewel-encircled black face that weighed heavily in the DI’s hand as he examined it. ‘Breitling Galactic,’ he read, from a booklet in the box. ‘Not much change out of ten thousand for that, if any, I’ll bet.’

  Singh bent, picked up the bundle, and unwrapped it. ‘Holy Moses,’ he murmured. ‘What the fuck is going on, Sauce?’ The pistol looked small in his huge hand, but deadly nonetheless. ‘This is a Beretta, fifteen-shot magazine, one of the most popular handguns in the world and one of the best. I know that because I did a firearms course a few years back, and this is what we used. What is a uniformed police officer in the West End doing with one of these?’

  ‘Or this lot.’

  The DI looked up at the sergeant from his kneeling position. Before him lay the brown envelope, ripped open to reveal two thick stacks of banknotes, and the food container, its lid removed, displaying stacks of coins, each one around an inch in diameter.

  ‘What are those?’ Singh asked.

  ‘These are Krugerrands,’ Haddock replied.

  ‘Are they chocolate?’

  ‘Not from the weight of the box; no, these are the real thing. Each one of these is worth around a thousand quid, maybe a shade more.’ He sighed. ‘You know, I was hoping that we’d be able to lock up here and go home to catch up on some of the sleep we’ve missed. No such fucking luck. I have to get the DCC down here, and somebody else too, somebody who’s going to be kicking himself when he sees these.’

  Eight

  ‘Yes?’

  The woman who opened the door had to be in her sixties, Skinner guessed, but she could have been his own age from the smoothness of her complexion. However, there was no doubting her hostility as she frowned at him, a frown that turned into a glare as she saw the police car in the courtyard of the converted steading.

  ‘It’s all right, Gran,’ a much younger voice called out from behind her. ‘It’s my friend Seonaid’s dad, Mr Skinner.’

  ‘Ah.’ Noele McClair’s mother’s posture eased, but only a little. ‘Come in,’ she said, grudgingly. ‘Harry,’ she called out to her grandson, ‘back to the kitchen. You’re not getting off with peeling the potatoes.’

  He tried to place her accent; it was Glaswegian, but refined, Kelvinside, or possibly even more up market, Bearsden.

  ‘Is Noele . . . ?’ he ventured.

  ‘She’s in the living room. I told her to go to bed but she said she couldn’t.’

  ‘Has she told you why she was called out?’

  Lines of pain appeared around Mrs McClair’s eyes. ‘Yes, she has. Harry doesn’t know yet, so be careful. I’m fair blazing mad that my daughter was put through that; I hope you had nothing to do with it, or that young Haddock.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ he assured her, ‘and Sauce wasn’t in a position to prevent it. For what it’s worth I agree with you. It was a misjudgement by senior officers, albeit in a very stressful situation.’

  ‘I hope you told them,’ she said, firmly.

  ‘I did, make no mistake. Not that I have any influence any longer.’

  ‘That’s not what I’ve heard.’ She opened a door at the end of the hall. ‘Dear, Mr Skinner’s here. I think he just wants to make sure you’re all right.’

  ‘More than that,’ he whispered. ‘I think she’s going to need you again after I’ve gone.’ He moved past her quickly, into the living room.

  Noele McClair stood as he entered, out of courtesy rather than deference. He waved a hand, signalling her to sit down again and joined her, taking an armchair beside a floor-to-ceiling picture window. ‘How are you doing?�
�� he asked. ‘Has it sunk in yet?’

  ‘I don’t really think so,’ she sighed. ‘Maybe it will after I’ve done the formal identification. We’ll see. At the moment my main worry is how to tell Harry. He worships his father. He’s only seven, Bob, it’ll crush him.’

  ‘It won’t. My Alex went through the same thing, and she came out all right. You’ll need to keep him close for a while, now and when the people who killed Terry are brought to court. If Sarah and I can help in any way, you only have to ask, no notice required.’

  She smiled at him, her eyes filled with tears. ‘Look at me,’ she croaked, with a strange stifled laugh. ‘I’d washed my hands of the bugger. We were divorced, and I was over him. Or I thought I was; now here I am unable to stop crying.’

  For a second or two, he found himself wanting to get out of there, to leave her with her grief without piling on even more. But he was held in place by the thought of how she would react if she heard the further news through the media, or even in casual conversation with a CID colleague.

  ‘You don’t have to do the formal identification,’ he pointed out. ‘You’re not his next of kin any longer; Harry is, although obviously he’s too young. Are Terry’s parents still alive? Does he have siblings?’

  ‘His dad died when he was young. His mother remarried and moved to Norway. I have no idea how to contact her. There’s a sister though, Beatrix. She lives in Paisley. But she’s flaky. She’s bipolar and on medication. I don’t think she’d be up to doing that. No, Bob. I’ll do it. She doesn’t have support, but I do, of a kind. I haven’t mentioned this to anyone, anyone at all, not even my mum, but I’m in a relationship.’

  ‘I know,’ Skinner said softly.

  She blinked the tears away and stared at him. ‘You do? How would you?’

  ‘My daughter told me.’

  ‘Seonaid? But she could only have heard from Harry, and I haven’t let anything slip to him because I’m not sure how he’ll take it.’

  ‘You misunderstand me. My oldest daughter: Alex. She had a drink with Griff Montell just before Christmas; he let it slip then. I’m sure he didn’t mean to, but Alex is a defence advocate, and she’s very good at cross-examination.’