Lamb to the Slaughter (40 page)

MacNee’s gaze sharpened and unconsciously he moved forward to the edge of his seat, catching for the first time the scent of a trail. ‘Now, why would he be wanting to do all that?’

‘You’d better ask him. I didn’t.’ Black looked entirely relaxed.

Mr Cool, that one. But MacNee had a trump card, and it was time to play it. He gave his menacing smile. ‘You see, Johnny, we’re interested in this “job” you were talking about having done for him, at the Forbes-Grahams’ party. Salaman seemed pretty angry about having it mentioned.’

The reaction wasn’t what he had expected. Black stared at him, then roared with laughter. ‘You don’t think I’m a hit man, do you? And even if you did – why would Salaman want the man dead? He’s money coming out of his ears – absolutely loaded.’

‘Revenge,’ MacNee suggested, hanging on grimly to his theory. ‘And there’s no such thing as enough when it comes to money. He stood to lose substantially if ALCO’s offer was turned down.’

That set Black laughing again. MacNee eyed him with frustration. ‘Care to share the joke?’ he said acidly.

‘Yes, well – that party. I should have known better. He’s a raving snob for a start – was a bit put out to find me at the same party he was at, even. And then to him private’s private, and this was – well, sensitive, you could say.

‘The thing was, he hadn’t got back to me about this “job” I’d done for him, and you always feel edgy with him until you know he’s satisfied. I blew it – it wasn’t the time or the place, and he was livid. Phoned me this morning and gave me a bollocking and sacked me, not that I care. I suppose he was worried I’d blurt out something about what he’d asked me to do.’

‘Which was?’ MacNee wasn’t enjoying this. It didn’t sound as if Salaman had contacted Black to tell him to keep his mouth shut, but it didn’t sound, either, as if it was going to matter much.

Black grinned. ‘He wanted to know which were the charities his grandfather would be most likely to disapprove of. The value of the property wasn’t big money to him – he just wanted to get shot of it with the least trouble to himself, and put up two fingers doing it. And when it’s all gone through I’m to send a statement to the newspapers, so everyone can see how much he despised everything his grandfather stood for.

‘I’d had to dig around the Colonel’s background already and he was the old-fashioned type, all for the Countryside Alliance and the old regiment and that, you know the kind of thing, so making a list was dead easy – Amnesty International, Greenpeace, anything in favour of gays or nuclear disarmament, the League Against Cruel Sports, Animal Rights. He wanted a list prepared so that he could have his people get in touch with their people – he really does talk like that.

‘He’s a chip on his shoulder a mile wide about the way his family was treated, so you were right about revenge, sergeant, but his was a bit more subtle than gunning down his grandfather.’

It had the ring of truth, that was the terrible thing. MacNee took down a few details – names of the kids Black claimed had been at the house on Saturday afternoon (Dylan, Barney and Gordon – the usual suspects), asked if he owned a shotgun and was told no, then took his leave, feeling dispirited.

Marjory Fleming drove home behind Bill in the old jeep, feeling sad but perfectly calm. Angus’s death came into the category that is usually described as ‘a merciful release’: it had been painful to watch a proud man become, in his needs, an oversized infant. If it had hurt her, how must her mother have felt?

Janet was principally on her mind. Angus had been her life: even this past year, when he showed no sign of recognising her and indeed, on a bad day, was likely to abuse her along with everyone else, she had spent hours at the home, bringing in his favourite home-baking, talking to him as if he could understand, chatting to other residents, who did. ‘She’s as good as an extra member of staff, dear soul,’ the matron had said affectionately to Marjory on one of her visits.

How would Janet cope? It worried her terribly; her mother had the habit of strength and Marjory had felt woefully inadequate on the occasions when comfort was needed.

As long as Angus was alive, Janet had a purpose to her life, and even latterly she could tell herself that, however little he might show it, he needed her. Her life would be empty, and once the shell of the man she had loved so faithfully all these years was no longer there, surely the memories of the man he had been before, the young man she had married, would engulf her in grief?

And Marjory began remembering herself. Angus’s speech at her own wedding, when he’d actually said, in public, that she was a ‘good lass’ and Bill was a lucky man. Her eyes began to sting. He’d been so thrilled when Cammie was born, too – ‘another man in the family’ – and so proud of his grandson’s rugby prowess. He hadn’t been much interested in Cat, of course – hard to forgive him for that – but, but ... that was just the way he was.

He’d been hard to please, but when she had managed to win his praise – like when she’d won the medal for the best athlete at the school sports – it always felt as if she’d been given a very special present. And would she be as she was now, without him challenging her?

Whatever he had been, he’d been her dad. Marjory felt tears start to gather, and she swallowed them back. She mustn’t think of herself. Janet would be waiting at the farm, and she had to be ready to be strong for her.

She reached the farm and drew up in the yard beside the jeep. Bill was waiting for her; he put his arm round her ­shoulder as they went into the mud-room. ‘How are you doing?’

Marjory managed a tight smile. ‘Fine. Is Mum on her own?’

‘Karolina’s with her. She’ll be all right.’

He held the kitchen door open. Karolina, sitting at one end of the kitchen table, looked up with a sympathetic smile. Janet, who had her back to the door, turned her head, and got up. She looked drained, but calm, and there was no sign that she had been crying. At the sight of Marjory, her face twisted in anxiety. ‘Oh, my bairn! Are you all right, dearie?’

And Marjory, bursting into tears, flung herself into her mother’s arms.

‘The police would like to see you again, Dylan.’ The maths teacher had just been handed a note by the school secretary. ‘You OK with that?’ he asked sympathetically.

Dylan shrugged. ‘No problem,’ he said, and went out with his hands in the pockets of his jeans, feeling the other kids watching him in a silence unusual in Sad Shane’s maths class.

It was terrible about Barney, of course it was, and last night he’d had the sort of dreams he didn’t like to think about, even in broad daylight, but in a way being a victim was quite cool. A girl he fancied who’d always frozen him out had come up and given him a big sloppy kiss. ‘It could have been you, Dylan! You could have been, like,
dead
.’ It would have been gross to make a move on her then, of course, but he reckoned he’d have a good chance later.

The cops in the waiting-room weren’t the ones who’d been there this morning. One was a ginger and the other was a big guy with a buzzcut who seemed to be in charge.

Buzzcut said, ‘Sorry to pull you out of class again, Dylan. What was it?’

‘Maths.’ He sat down in one of the chairs and leaned back, stretching out his legs. ‘It’s a doss anyway. No one does any work.’

‘I’ll try and spin this out a bit for you, shall I?’

It was tragic when they tried to get all chummy and jokey. Dylan ignored the attempt, and Buzzcut got the message.

‘Right, I’ll tell you what we wanted to know. Did you see Barney last Saturday afternoon?’

Well, doh! ‘I told you already he was my best mate. What else?’

‘Fine. So what did you do?’

‘I’d a problem with the throttle of my bike, so I went round to Johnny’s so he could fix it for me. He said me and Barney and Gordon could stay and watch football with him – he’s got Sky.’

‘Johnny Black? How long were you there?’

‘Dunno. Till we went for chips, later. Gordon went home for his tea.’

He saw the two men glance at each other. ‘Did Barney stay too?’

By now, he’d had quite a lot of experience of the polis, one way or another. This was obviously the big question, though he couldn’t quite see why. ‘Yeah. Till we went out to the Square. That’s where we hang out.’

‘We’ve noticed.’ Buzzcut was being sarky now. ‘So, what time was that?’

Dylan scowled. ‘Dunno. Look, how was I to know anyone would care? Don’t even wear a watch.’

‘That’s OK,’ Buzzcut said hastily. ‘Just roughly – after seven, say?’

‘Later, probably. Eight, maybe – I dunno.’

‘And then—?’

Dylan remembered, suddenly, what they had done that evening and coloured. ‘We kind of mucked about. Then a bunch of us went back to Johnny’s for a couple of beers and we were there till one o’clock, half-one maybe?’

‘Johnny’s a mate of yours too, is he?’

‘We-ell, not exactly – like, he’s old, isn’t he? But he’s pretty cool. And ...’ Dylan hesitated, feeling awkward about saying it out loud, ‘he’s with my mum now. So it’ll be sort of like he’s my dad. We’ll be staying at his place.’ It gave him a good feeling, saying that.

‘Sounds all right. Now, do you know if anyone had a grudge against Barney? Any reason why anyone would have wanted to kill him?’

Dylan looked blank. ‘Apart from her at the farm, you mean? Well – no.’ He didn’t try to hide his contempt at the stupid question. Everyone knew snipers just did it for kicks – except the dumb cops.

‘Or you?’

Where did they get these guys? Straight out of Form
3
, remedial? ‘’Course not. That’s just daft.’

‘That’s all we needed, right?’ Buzzcut glanced at Ginger. He didn’t say anything, just went on scribbling in a notebook. ‘We’ll be having a chat with your pal Gordon now, but that’s all we need from you. Thanks, son.’

Afterwards, Dylan drifted off outside. The bell hadn’t gone for the end of the period yet and he didn’t fancy another session with Sad Shane. Feeling in his pocket for his fags, he headed for the waste ground at the back of the boiler-house.

MacNee glanced at his watch as he came out of Ellie Burnett’s flat. He’d hoped to go across and have a word with Ossian, warn him off Ellie, but Bailey wanted him back at the station to brief him on any developments before the press conference at four. The Super would go ballistic if he was kept waiting, so he’d better get back with the unwelcome news that another theory had run into the sand.

Pity. Black’s background made the contract killing theory less fanciful than it might otherwise have seemed, and Salaman fitted the part – cold, clinical and with the kind of money that made guys think whatever you wanted could be bought. Black was wary of crossing him, and even the boss had been pretty keen to be sure they got it right where he was concerned.

Suddenly, an idea came to him. It was an unscrupulous, wicked, dangerous idea. He certainly shouldn’t do it, and if Fleming had been around he wouldn’t even have considered it. Could he get away with it? Trying to think of all the angles, he drove back to the station.

DC Kerr sat back in her chair and closed the computer ­document she’d been reading. She’d had a rotten afternoon; all she wanted to do was go home, fling herself on the bed and howl. The sort of pounding headache she had would have been a legitimate excuse, but working on through it was a sort of penance. She hadn’t even taken painkillers. She deserved to suffer.

The humiliation was bad enough, as was the knowledge that she’d lost the boss’s respect, and Tam’s too, though he’d been kind. But the shame was worse. You could live down humiliation, but shame ate away at your inmost being.

All she could do to blot out her wretched thoughts was to work flat out. Will was around; he’d gone past her a couple of times but she hadn’t looked up and she knew he hadn’t looked at her either.

Still, her frantic onslaught had other uses too. She’d always prided herself on her attention to detail and a couple of nuggets of information had come to light that she could usefully follow up.

From their order book, the pizza place had been able to give Kerr a time fix – seven o’clock, which showed that Norman Gloag was being at the very least economical with the truth. Big Marge had all but ruled him out, but the fact remained that he’d have had more than enough time to get himself out to Wester Seton before the boys arrived, even if he’d walked. He might well have done that, given it was less than half-a-mile out of Kirkluce, and he certainly wouldn’t have wanted to advertise his presence with a parked car. An appeal had already gone out to the public, asking for reports of any suspicious activity near the farm, but without results; maybe if they asked specifically about anyone on foot, cutting across the fields, say, something more might come in.

Kerr had found, too, the report from the uniform who’d checked the CCTV footage for Saturday. It hadn’t been cross-checked against the statements yet, but what it told her was interesting – very interesting. Giles Farquharson, who had claimed he had driven in from Ravenshill in convoy with his wife to the superstore meeting, had appeared at
17
.
45
from a totally different direction.

Now what she needed to do was run through the film from Monday evening. She phoned to get it sent through.