Dead Men's Bones (Inspector Mclean 4) (28 page)

‘Jesus
Christ, this is a mess. Thirty bodies. Thirty fucking bodies! Have you any idea what kind of grief I’m getting?’

The morning after the gruesome discoveries at Rosskettle Hospital, and McLean wasn’t at all surprised to find himself hauled up in front of Duguid. He pulled out his phone, flicked it on and held it up for the detective superintendent to see.

‘Not just you, sir. I’ve had sixteen calls from Jo Dalgliesh in the past three hours, and she’s not even supposed to have this number.’

Duguid rubbed at weary eyes with his prehensile fingers. ‘You really do know how to fuck things up, don’t you?’

‘Why does everyone think this is my fault? Not like I put all those bodies in the ground myself.’

‘No, but you had to go and dig them all up, didn’t you?’

McLean bit back the retort he wanted to give. No point descending to Duguid’s level. ‘I can’t un-find them, sir. We have to investigate. And there’s one small bit of silver lining in all this.’

‘There is?’ Duguid looked genuinely surprised.

‘Aye, there is. The press are so excited by this mass grave they’ve completely forgotten about Andrew-bloody-Weatherly.’

‘How
long’s that going to last, though?’ Duguid muttered to himself, pulled some folders across from the mess all over his desk. ‘It’s a major incident now. That’s official. So you’ll be handing over to DCI Brooks. I have oversight of the whole thing for now, but it might go higher yet.’ He shook his head as if that might make it all go away. ‘What the fuck’s actually happening out there?’

‘Best guess so far is that there’s been an unofficial burial ground there for as long as the hospital. Maybe even before. If they were all ancient, then we’d just get the archaeologists in, but some of these burials are recent. At least in the last ten years or so.’

‘So who are they? Dead lunatics?’

Nothing like sympathy for the victims. ‘Could be. The older ones almost certainly. We won’t know until the pathologists have finished with them.’

‘Well, hurry them up, McLean. We need answers fast, or this is going to blow up in our faces.’

‘Always thought you were one to watch.’

He should have gone straight to DCI Brooks’s office and then organised a major incident room for the investigation. Instead, McLean had taken his opportunity, and dashed out for a decent cup of coffee and something to eat. He should have known better, of course. That was how she’d caught him the last time.

‘I’ve nothing to say to you, Ms Dalgliesh.’ McLean ducked into the coffee shop, only to find a queue snaking its way up to the counter. Dalgliesh slipped in behind him. Trapped.

‘C’mon.
I’ll buy youse a coffee if you just give us the heads-up.’

‘You don’t know already?’ Despite himself, McLean couldn’t help rising to the bait.

‘Oh, aye. Lots of SOC vans and the likes out at the old loony bin. Ten vans heading back to the mortuary. University archaeology team wandering about the place talking about an ancient burial site not mentioned in any of their precious history books. Sounds like a mystery to me.’

Trust the civilians to speak out of turn. Either that or Dalgliesh was making stuff up in the hope he’d fill in the gaps for her. On the other hand, she’d had someone following the vans taking the remains back to the mortuary. Chances were she’d had a few unattributable tip-offs too. Amazing what a little bit of cash could do if you found the right officer to flash it at.

‘We’re having a press conference this afternoon. Can’t you wait until then?’

‘And miss my scoop?’ Dalgliesh looked genuinely hurt. ‘I know you’ve found bodies. Lots of them. I’m just looking for a few more details. Like how old they are.’

‘It’s only been a day. Let the pathologists do their job, aye?’

‘So they’re old then. Twenty years or more?’ Now she was fishing.

‘This is a major enquiry. I can’t say anything until we know what we’re dealing with.’

‘Major enquiry, eh?’ Dalgliesh’s eyebrow shot up. ‘So you’re no’ the man in charge.’

‘Not even close. I report to DCI Brooks. Duguid’s
Gold on this one. At least for now. You never know, it might escalate beyond even his enormous capacity.’

‘And the archaeologists?’

‘Should learn to keep their mouths shut.’ McLean had reached the head of the queue, ordered his coffee, gave his name and added, ‘She’s paying.’ Dalgliesh scowled, but pulled out a crumpled ten pound note from the pocket of her leather coat and handed it over with her own order.

‘Look, you’ve got to give me something.’ Dalgliesh leaned against the counter, waiting impatiently for the barista to do her business. ‘What were you looking for out there, anyway?’

‘That’s part of an ongoing investigation, so I really can’t discuss it.’

‘Oh, come on. You must have had a reason to go poking about down there.’ Dalgliesh scratched at her face with a yellow fingernail. ‘Your tattooed body wasn’t all that far away, was it? Washed down the river. You reckon he was a loony?’

‘The hospital’s been closed almost twelve years. William Beaumont was living on the streets, but he wasn’t ever a patient at Rosskettle.’

‘So that was why you were there.’ Dalgliesh had a grin on her like the Cheshire Cat’s idiot half-cousin. ‘And you reckon whoever did for him did for all these others. And them going back hundreds of years.’ Maybe not such an idiot.

‘Look, Dalgliesh. I can’t say much because I don’t know much. Not yet, at least. Yes, I can confirm we’ve found bodies, and some of them have been in the ground
a long time. Foul play, or just an unregistered burial ground used by the mental hospital before everything became more regulated? Who knows? I aim to find out, and that would be a lot easier if you held back from publishing your usual lurid speculation. The last thing I need is the conspiracy nutters wandering on to a potential crime scene.’

‘Conspiracy nutters. Can I quote you on that?’

McLean grabbed his coffee the moment it arrived, somewhat startling the lady who handed it to him. He felt bad about that until he realized she’d spelt his name ‘Maclean’, like the toothpaste. Dalgliesh’s own drink hadn’t been made yet and he leapt at the chance to escape.

‘Print what you want. You just make it all up anyway.’

He left the journalist standing at the counter, preparing her response. Hurried out the door before she decided badgering him for more answers was worth more than an abandoned latte. Everything was going to hell anyway, what did it matter if he pissed off the press now?

Two
days later, and things were going from bad to worse. Scene Examination Branch had so far found the remains of twenty-nine bodies, neatly buried a couple of hundred yards away from the old outbuildings of the hospital. All adult, all male, some were little more than bones, but three were more recent. Dr MacPhail, for all his apparent youth, had spent a couple of years helping to identify bodies from mass graves, and was now overseeing the whole process with a macabre glee that suggested when older he would fit the Angus Cadwallader mould well. The senior pathologist seemed happy to let his underling shine, less happy at the growing number of bodies now filling up his mortuary.

As yet, none of the bodies had been identified, but one thing was obvious enough from what they had found. All of them that still had skin were extensively tattooed; intricate swirls of black ink covering them from head to toe. It wasn’t hard to see the picture forming: a regular killing, structured, well organized, sacrificial. What McLean couldn’t work out as he sat alone in his office, late into the night, was what the sacrifices were for.

Of course, poor old Billbo Beaumont had escaped. After the tattoos had been done, but before the final act. Not that it had done him much good, alone and terrified,
probably half crazy from whatever drugs they’d used to sedate him, the other half crazy already. In the dark and snow, running naked through fences and gorse bushes until his fear took him over the cliff. But how long had this been going on before that happened? Twenty-nine bodies, Billbo number thirty. One a year? Probably one every ten, by the age of some of them. Nearly three centuries’ worth.

McLean shuddered as he stared, unseeing, at the report on his screen. The press were having a field day, not helped by the tendency of the archaeological team brought in to help the forensics effort to talk long and loud about their latest theories in the pub every night. He’d spoken to their boss, a wannabe Indiana Jones-type with a stupid hat and an even stupider faith in his own abilities. This hadn’t worked, of course, and the lack of support from his superiors had only made things worse.

At least the disappearance and recovery of Weatherly’s body seemed to have passed without notice, but that didn’t mean the question didn’t still need an answer. Who had taken his body to Rosskettle? Why had they buried it there in the grounds so close to all those others, just waiting to be found? Almost as if it had been a signpost for them. It was far too big a coincidence, and anyway McLean didn’t believe in coincidences.

A knock on the open door startled him out of his thoughts. DC Gregg stood in the doorway, looking somewhat uncertain about whether she could come in or not. Moving to plain clothes seemed to have quietened her down a bit, which had to be a good thing.

‘You
still here, Constable?’ McLean tried a weary smile, got one back in return.

‘Don’t think anyone’s going to be doing much sleeping for a while, sir.’

McLean shook his head gently in reply. ‘Anything I can do for you?’

‘There’s a woman in reception asking to see you. Duty sergeant’s tried to put her off, but she’s insistent.’

‘Does this woman have a name?’ McLean glanced from the detective constable to his desk phone, wondering why no one had called up. It wouldn’t have surprised him to find out the switchboard was buggered and all his calls were being routed to a cupboard on the fourth floor.

‘Said her name was Jenny Denton, sir. Keeps going on about the devil being in the details. Least, I think that’s what she’s saying. She’s not exactly dealing from a full deck, if you get my meaning.’

It was the same interview room where he and Grumpy Bob had interviewed Mrs Saifre, and yet while then it had been stifling hot, now it was as if there were no walls and they were sitting out in the frosty night. McLean had sent DC Gregg off in search of warming tea, and perhaps a few biscuits. Now he sat alone with Jennifer Denton, both of them huddled into their jackets against the cold.

At least Miss Denton was dressed for the part. McLean couldn’t remember how long it was since last he’d spoken to her, but the days had not been kind. He remembered a woman in total control, well turned-out and proper. It
had surprised him to find out that she was doing anything so tawdry as having an affair with her boss. Now she looked haggard, her hair unwashed, face completely without make-up. She was greyer than he remembered, and she looked as if she were suffering from some terrible wasting disease.

‘You have to stop, Inspector.’

McLean shivered, although whether it was at the cold or Miss Denton’s voice, he couldn’t be sure. She spoke in a hoarse whisper, quite at odds with the confidence bordering on arrogance of before.

‘Stop? Stop what?’

‘You have to leave it alone. No good will come of it. No good at all.’

McLean tried to catch Miss Denton’s eye, but she wouldn’t look straight at him. She’d avoided his gaze almost from the moment she’d seen him come into the reception area at the front of the station, staring at the floor or her hands for most of the time.

‘Miss Denton. Jennifer. You came here to see me. You obviously wanted to tell me something. Has someone been threatening you?’

At that, she looked up, just briefly. A thin smile ghosted across her lips. ‘I’m beyond threats, Inspector. I’m damned whatever I do. I just don’t want any more people getting caught up in it.’

‘Caught up in what?’

‘I’ve not been home, you know. Not since the funeral, the wake.’ Miss Denton studied her hands again, and McLean could see that they were dirty, black marks under the fingernails. ‘Not a good time of year to start
sleeping on the streets. Safer there, though. Least I thought it was.’

‘You’ve been living rough—’

‘Saw in the papers that you’d found the bodies. Buried out at the hospital.’ Miss Denton stared at him now, as if it had taken her this long to summon up the courage. ‘Always thought Drew was up to no good. That place had an unnatural hold on him.’

‘You knew? That he was born there?’

Miss Denton gave the most minimal of nods. ‘It wasn’t common knowledge, but it wasn’t exactly a secret either. I take it you know the story?’

‘His mum was locked in there for getting pregnant, disgracing the family name. Yes, I’ve heard the story.’

‘And you know the kind of man it made him into. What he did to them when he found out.’

‘Seems he wasn’t one to take no for an answer.’

‘That’s a very kind way of putting it, Inspector.’ Miss Denton scratched at her eyelid with a quivering finger. Her whole arm was shaking like she had the DTs. McLean recalled the wake, her swift disposal of two glasses of wine. That single red drop on her pure white blouse. It was very possible she might be a functioning alcoholic who’d not had a drink in days. Perhaps not at her most reliable, then.

‘So how did he find out? About his true family, that is?’

‘I expect his mother told him, before she went mad. You’d think that would put him off the place, but he always had a thing for that hospital. Spent so much time there.’

‘Did you ever go with him?’

Miss
Denton’s shakes disappeared for a moment, a look of genuine shock on her face. It didn’t last long. ‘Me? Heavens no. That was Drew’s place.’

‘But you knew what went on there.’

‘I …’ Miss Denton hesitated, either unable or unwilling to speak.

‘We found his body buried in the hospital grounds. Someone took it from the crypt and put it there, close to all those other bodies. Almost as if we were meant to find him, and them.’ McLean placed his arms on the table, leaned forward. ‘You know who did that, don’t you Miss Denton.’

‘I … I can’t … To name it is to summon it.’

Miss Denton shook her head violently from side to side, plunging her hands into her lap and hunching over like a small child trying not to be forced into doing something.

‘But you know.’

McLean let the words drift into silence, waited until Miss Denton calmed enough to nod. When she looked up again, there were tears in her eyes, tracks clearing the grime off her cheeks.

‘I’m going to hell, Inspector. There’s nothing I can do about that. You can’t save me, but you can save others. Save yourself.’

‘Save myself? From what? How?’ McLean leaned forward across the table, trying once more to catch Miss Denton’s eye. There was something not right about her now, even more so than when she had first come in. She was twitching like a person with advanced Parkinson’s disease. What he’d taken to be a shaking of the head to
indicate that she couldn’t say now looked more like an involuntary muscle spasm.

‘You have to leave it alone.’ The words were coming in gasps now; Miss Denton was having some kind of seizure. McLean leapt up, took two steps around the table to get to her side. At the same moment, the door opened and DC Gregg appeared in the doorway, three steaming mugs in her hand, packet of biscuits clamped under one arm. Her eyes widened in surprise, the biscuits tumbling to the floor.

‘Get help. And call an ambulance.’

Gregg paused only to put the mugs down, slopping hot coffee on the chipped Formica before she turned and fled. McLean felt a hand grab his arm, shaking it hard as the spasms ripped through Jennifer Denton’s small frame. She pulled him close, forcing words out through clenched teeth.

‘If. You. Keep. Digging. More. Will. Die.’