Hand for a Hand (2 page)

Gilchrist decided to change tack and felt a flicker of annoyance that he had to bring the subject up. But he needed to know. “How’s Mum?” he asked, and grimaced as he waited for the answer.

“Not good, Andy. Not good at all.”

“How long?”

“Couple of months. Maybe less.”

“Jesus.”

“They’ve got her on morphine.”

“Is she still at home?”

“You know Mum.”

Gilchrist pulled to a halt behind a traffic jam. Ahead, the grey silhouette of St. Salvator’s spire and the Abbey ruins lined the dark skyline. By the University buildings, black rocks fell to a blacker sea. He closed his eyes, dug in his thumb and forefinger.

Gail. Sometimes he felt as if he still loved her. Other times he was not sure if it was being betrayed that had given him the right to wallow in self-pity. He never understood why he still cared for her. Was it hurt over her infidelity? Or her utter rejection of him once she left? Or jealousy at her having found someone else? And now she was dying and—

“Andy?”

Gilchrist looked up. “Sorry, Jack. Stuck in traffic. Is Maureen still helping out?”

“I guess.”

“You heard from her?”

“About a week ago.”

“I’ve left umpteen messages on her answering machine.”

“That’s Mo for you.”

“It runs in the family.”

“Hey, we’re talking. Right?”

Gilchrist chuckled. “If you talk to her, Jack, tell her to check her messages and give me a call.” Jack grunted, which he took to mean yes. The Citroën in front lurched forward with a burst of exhaust. Gilchrist followed. “Thanks, Jack. Catch you later.”

Gilchrist thought it odd how different his children had become. Maureen and Jack were growing apart,
had
grown apart, professionally, politically, socially and, even though he hated to say it, financially. Where Mo was self-reliant and careful with money, taking part-time jobs for extra cash, Jack could go months without selling a sculpture or painting, and no commissioned work in sight. He often wondered how Jack survived, then ditched that thought for fear of the answer.

But Mo was different. A young woman with definite views on how to run her life, with no sympathy for those who struggled. If Gilchrist struggled with his relationship with his daughter, what chance did Jack have of getting through to her?

He pulled onto the road that led to the Driving Range, then powered towards the Old Course Hotel. He found a parking spot close to the Jigger Inn. Beyond the stone dyke that bounded the course, a white Transit van spilled Scenes of Crime Officers in white hooded coveralls—six in total. The putting green was encircled with yellow tape that trailed to the walls at the side of the road for which the Old Course’s Road Hole was infamous.

Nance caught his eye as he cleared the dyke. Behind her, the stooped figure of Bert Mackie, the police pathologist, was slipping into the bunker, his assistant, Dougie Banks, helping him down. Nance signalled to Gilchrist as she walked across the green, away from the bunker and the SOCOs.

Puzzled, he followed her.

When she stopped, he said, “You look worried.”

“Ronnie’s here.”

“Ronnie?” Then the name slotted into the tumblers of his mind with a surge of disbelief. “Ronnie
Watt
?” He eyed the green, settling on the back of a broad-shouldered man in a dark blue suit, felt his legs move as if of their own accord—

Something clamped his arm.

“He’s not worth it.” Nance tightened her grip. “He’s Crime Scene Manager.”

“Not on my shift, he’s not. Alan can take over.”

“No he can’t. Greaves has assigned Ronnie.”

Gilchrist shook his arm free. “Is Greaves out of his bloody mind?”

“Andy. Don’t. It’s in the past.”

But Gilchrist was already striding away.

Chapter 3

“G
REAVES SPEAKING.”

“It’s Andy Gilchrist, Tom.”

“Andy. I was wondering when I’d hear from you.”

I bet you were, you blundering old maniac
. “I’ve got a complaint.”

“Certainly, Andy. Let’s have it.”

Chief Super Greaves’ politeness almost threw him. So, rather than struggle with fake diplomacy, Gilchrist pulled the trigger. “What the hell’s Ronnie Watt doing here?”

“He’s on temporary assignment from Strathclyde—”

“You do know about Ronnie and me?”

“I do, Andy.”

“Well, surely you must appreciate—”

“Watt is back with Fife Constabulary and assigned to the St. Andrews Division of the Crime Management Department, as are you. Part of my remit is to assign officers to solve crimes as I see fit. And with the shortage in manpower I’m bloody grateful for experienced overload relief—”

“As Senior Investigating Officer I assign my own team. And the last—”

“You’re not the SIO on this case.”

For one confusing second, Gilchrist wondered if he had misunderstood. “They found a note with—”

“Yes, yes, I know all about the note.”

“Whoever committed this crime wants me on it. I need to be involved.”

“I’ll be SIO, Andy. But with all the paperwork I’ve got at the
moment I’m assigning you to take charge. Ronnie will be your assistant.”

“I thought he was Crime Scene Manager.”

“DC Alan Bowers will take over. Is that clear?”

Crystal. Gilchrist gripped his mobile. He had misjudged the Chief Super. Greaves had no intention of becoming involved. Assigning Gilchrist as a temporary SIO was like fiddling the books. “One final question,” he said. “Why put Watt and me together?”

“Because in this Division I don’t want anyone to harbour past grievances. We work together as a team. Does that make it any clearer?”

Watt was staring at him, chewing gum like some tough-guy posing. In that instant, Gilchrist made up his mind. “Clear as mud,” he said, and clapped his mobile shut.

Watt widened his stance as Gilchrist stepped down the slope on the other side of the green. At six-one, Gilchrist and Watt were identical in height. But where Gilchrist was long-limbed and lean, Watt was stocky and broad. And Gilchrist was a young forty-seven to Watt’s ravaged thirty-three. Too many late nights drinking and bullying had aged Watt beyond his years.

Watt thrust out his hand. “Good to see you again, Andy.”

Gilchrist eyeballed him. “Don’t push it,” he snarled. He waited for Watt to lower his hand. “And it’s DCI Gilchrist,” he added, then turned to Mackie. “What’ve you got, Bert?”

Watt stepped forward. “This—”

“Is your name Bert?” Gilchrist snapped.

Watt flashed his teeth, worked his gum. “… is addressed to you.” He held out an envelope, creased where it had been crushed between the dead woman’s fingers.

Gilchrist noted his name printed on it. “Tell me it’s been dusted,” he said to Nance.

“It’s been dusted,” she said.

“Anything?”

“Nothing.” Watt again. “It’s been wiped clean.”

Gilchrist eyed Watt. “We seem to have a problem here.”

“We do?”

“You have a habit of answering questions not addressed to you.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Let’s get one thing clear—”

“Oh for goodness sake, stop squabbling and lend me a hand.” Mackie clambered from the bunker, his face reddened from the effort, or frustration at having to listen to two grown men bickering. Gilchrist grasped Mackie by his gloved hand and pulled.

Out of the bunker, Mackie gave a stiff stretch, grimacing as he pulled his shoulders back. “Oh to be young again.” He peeled back the hood of his coveralls to reveal a bald pate as red as his face. Then he padded up the slope to the green.

Gilchrist struggled to ignore Watt’s presence as he trailed Mackie.

On the green, he asked the old man, “What do you think?”

Mackie grimaced. “That it’s only a matter of time until the rest of the body turns up.”

“So it’s murder. Not amputation.”

Mackie shook his head. “Impossible to say. But whosever hand that is was dead when it was hacked off.” He flapped a hand at Dougie. “Bring it here,” he grumped.

Dougie removed a plastic bag from the SOCO Transit van and carried it across the putting green. Although Dougie was a doctor in his own right, in the presence of Mackie he seemed more like a student. Mackie grabbed the bag with a thankless lunge, and it pleased Gilchrist to watch Watt step in beside Dougie as he returned to the Transit van.

Mackie dangled the bag in front of Gilchrist, prodded the fingers with a gloved hand. “See here?” he said. “The tips of the first three fingers are slightly flattened. Base of the thumb, too. And what could be lividity at the heel of the palm. See?”

Gilchrist peered through the clear bag, thankful that it protected him from the smell of decomposing flesh.

“I’d say she was killed first, then placed on her back, probably on something hard, while she was cut up.” Mackie held out his left arm, bent his fingers into the shape of a claw. “Imagine this is her arm. If it was by her side, it would rest on the floor like this. See?”

“She died without a struggle?”

Mackie lowered his arm. “There appear to be no signs of distress in the fingernails, or the skin. No self-defence wounds. Nothing that would suggest she put up a struggle. But I’ll be more definitive once I’ve had a closer look in the lab.”

“Any idea of age, size, anything that would help us pin her down?”

Mackie puffed out his cheeks, let out a rush of air. “Somewhere between fifteen and thirty. Average height at five-four, five-eight. On the frail side, I’d say. Which could give the impression of being taller than she really was. And from what I can tell, I would say she was a natural blonde, too.”

Gilchrist made a mental note. “Occupation?”

Mackie shook his head. “The skin is fine, though a tad rough near the ends, the nails clean, so we can rule out any manual work. If she’s not from out of town, I’d be looking at University records. A student, perhaps. But I couldn’t say at this point.”

“No signs of distress in the fingernails? Nance said they were cracked.”

“First guess would be not work-related, but poor maintenance, poor diet, that sort of thing. All in all the hand looks clean, almost delicate.”

“Were the fingernails trimmed?”

“They were.”

“Before or after death?”

Mackie shook his head. “No clear way of telling. But I’ll look into that. If they were trimmed after death, maybe it was to clean them of incriminating evidence.”

“Like skin scrapings?”

“Yes. But that would suggest a struggle, and everything about this hand suggests otherwise.”

“How soon after death was the hand amputated?”

“Rigor mortis has set in. So, we’re somewhere between twenty-four and forty-eight hours. I’d put us smack dab in the middle, say, at thirty-six hours.”

Gilchrist stared back along the undulating fairway, seeking out the distant figures of uniformed constables combing the bunkers. From behind the hotel, he caught the dying whine from the helicopter’s engine. Groups of people looked out of opened windows. On the walkway below, a straggling line of spectators dotted the boundary wall. He returned to Mackie. “Thirty-six hours places her time of death near midnight the night before last.”

“Precisely.”

“As good a time as any to kill someone?”

“Then hack them to pieces.”

Gilchrist gritted his teeth. How someone could chop another human being into bits was beyond him. What went through their heads as they were doing that? What prompted someone to kill? Most murders were committed by someone who knew the victim. But in this case Gilchrist knew the murderer was someone who knew
him
.

He faced Mackie, struck by how clear the old man’s eyes looked against the weathered grain of his face, like jewels set in blemished wood. A narrow line of white stubble ran under his chin where he had missed with the razor.

“Anything else you can tell me, Bert?”

Mackie held the plastic bag level with his eyes. “The middle finger has a nick in the skin,” he said, and pointed at it. The bag twisted in his hand.

“A paper cut?”

“No. To the side of the nail. It’s almost as if she’s pulled the
skin back to the cuticle. Not all the way back, mind you. The other fingers are quite tidy.”

“Not a nail-biter, then?” Gilchrist worried at his need to seek further reassurance.

“This woman has never bitten her nails. But cuts and cracks and flaking skin and the like are a natural process of everyday life. It looks as if this nick had healed. And maybe reopened.”

Gilchrist failed to see the significance of Mackie’s comment. “Reopened in a struggle?” he tried.

“No. That’s not what I’m saying.” Mackie pulled the bag closer. The plastic almost touched his nose. “There’s some discoloration in the cut. Here.”

“Dried blood?”

“Not blood. No. It looks yellow.”

“Like an old bruise?”

“No.” Mackie swung the plastic bag towards Gilchrist and pointed at the middle finger. “See here,” he said. “It could be paint.”

“What kind of paint?”

“Couldn’t say at this stage.”

Movement to the side caught Gilchrist’s eye. Watt was stepping from the SOCO van. “Listen, Bert, I’ll leave you to it. As soon as you find out anything else, get back to me.” He turned and walked towards Nance.

“Hey.”

Gilchrist stopped on the edge of the green.

Watt was walking toward him like a lion with its eyes on a limping springbok. He waved a hand. “We need to talk.”

Gilchrist turned, stepped down the slope, and stood at the edge of the bunker. One of the SOCOs was on his hands and knees, brushing samples of sand from an indentation that Gilchrist assumed had been made by the hand. He heard Watt’s breathing behind him.

“What’s granddad saying?” Watt asked him.

“You’ll read his report when he’s finished.”

“Will he live that long?”

“You had something to say?”

“Been on the phone with Greaves.”

“Good for you.”

“And I don’t like it any more than you do.”

Gilchrist barked a laugh. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

Watt twisted his head, spat out his gum. “Look,” he said. “My life’s changed.
I’ve
changed. I’m a different person.”