Thursday legends - Skinner 10 (6 page)

'Eh?
Can't the Division handle it?'

'The
Division is handling it, but I have to be seen up front on this one.'

'What's
so special then?'

'The
victim: ex-Special Branch. It's Alec Smith.'

The
DCC's gasp seemed to fill the car. 'You're joking. What does the
"suspicious" mean?'

'He
was tortured and, or, battered to death. I've seen them
after
a month in the water, or burned to a crisp, but this is the worst ever.'

'I'm
glad you didn't call me out, then. I can live without that.'

Martin
chuckled, grimly; he knew that Skinner had come to detest bloody crime scenes.
'Don't be so glad. The guys who did it made a movie of the event and left it
behind for us.'

'Some
Saturday morning viewing, that.'

'Aye.
Dead and Kicking,
you might call it. Listen, Bob, we'll need the
best available pathologist for the post-mortem. Professor Hutchison's on
holiday, so
...'

Skinner
anticipated his friend's question. 'Sarah,' he called across the room, 'Andy's
got a hot one. He's asking if you'll do it.'

In
the background, he heard her reply. 'For him, okay. I guess he means today.'
'When, Andy?' 'Soonest.'

'Okay,'
Bob told him. 'Book it for midday. But call in for me on your way past. I'm
coming along there with you. My Saturday foursome's just become a three-ball.'

7

Bob
Skinner shook his head as he stood in front of the house in which Alec Smith
had been butchered. A small group of journalists and photographers stood on the
other side of Forth Street. 'You know, Andy,' he said to his friend, 'I must be
losing my touch. I'm a copper, I should know things. On top of that, I like to
think of myself as part of the East Lothian community.

'Yet
Alec Smith, an old acquaintance and colleague, lived in the middle of it for
...
What? Three years, you say
...
and I hadn't a bloody clue.'

The
Head of CID glanced at him, surprised. 'I didn't know that you and DCI Smith
were pals.'

'Well,
sort of. He played football with my Thursday night crowd for a few years,
before his right knee gave out on him. He lived out Pencaitland way in those
days, with his wife. She did a runner, though, a year or two before Alec packed
it in. Went off with a plumber, or something. I guess he must have moved here
in the aftermath of that.' Skinner paused. 'There were a couple of kids, son
and daughter; they'll probably be well into their twenties by now. He lived
here alone, you said?'

'That's
what the voters' register says. We'll see if the door-to-door tells us anything
about lady-friends - not that this murder was your run-of-the-mill domestic'

'No
indeed. Better let me see where it happened, then.'

Another
uniformed constable, so new in the force that Skinner did not know his name,
was stationed at Alec Smith's front door. He stood to attention as the
unmistakable figure of the Deputy Chief Constable approached. 'Morning, son,'
Skinner said. 'This is a bloody awful job you've got: doorkeeper at a
slaughterhouse. But I've done it in my time and so has Mr Martin. Just don't
let the gawpers gather at the gate. The same goes for the press over there, and
for the television crews when they turn up
...
as they will. This is a narrow street and the traffic comes whizzing round that
bend sometimes. We don't want another body here, if we can help it.'

'Very
good, sir,' the young man replied, put at his ease by the DCC's friendly
manner.

'Who's
in there?' asked Martin.

'No
one, sir. They're all round the corner at the mobile HQ.'

'Then
why's the front door open?'

'Inspector
Dorward said to leave it open, sir. To blow the smell out of the place, he
said.' Skinner winced, as he stood aside to let Martin lead the way into the
house.

Even
after Dorward's crew of technicians had done their work, the room upstairs
still seemed relatively tidy, considering what had happened there. The slatted
blinds were closed once more, but the windows had been opened and they were
blowing up and rattling on the through draught. In spite of it all, some of the
stench from the night before crept back into the Head of CID's nostrils.

Smith's
clothes still lay across the armchair, where the killers had left them. A blue
velvet drape still lay across the back of the sofa. The whisky bottle and
glasses were still on the table, and the telescope was still on its stand,
although they had all been dusted with white fingerprint powder. The cameras
were gone from the desk, though, taken away by Dorward as ordered. The only
other thing missing from the room since Martin's first visit was the body
itself.

Its
presence lingered nonetheless. Directly below the hook in the roof beam from
which it had hung, a dark stain disfigured the beige carpet.

"The
room was like this when you were here last night?' Skinner asked.

'Yes.
No signs of a struggle, as you can see. I guess that Alec must have known the
guys.'

'Guys?'

'There
must have been more than one, surely, to handle a big, rough bloke like him
with no obvious effort.'

'Aye,
but you said that he was battered about the head. Couldn't a single bloke have
slugged him from behind, knocked him unconscious, then strung him up?'

Martin
frowned. 'He could have, but if it had happened that way, then almost certainly
there would have been blood spattered around. I don't see any. I reckon he must
have been overpowered, and that would have taken more than one guy.'

The
older man grunted. 'Knowing Alec Smith, age fifty plus or not, I can promise
you that it would have taken a small fucking army to overpower him, strip him,
tie him and hoist him up on that hook. No, somehow or other he must have been
knocked unconscious.'

'That's
something else Sarah will have to tell us, then,' the DCS murmured.

Skinner
looked around the room: at the expensive, carefully-placed furniture,
television and video; the tall lamp in the far corner; the lap-top computer on
the desk; the bookshelves built in to the back wall; the ornaments on the desk,
table and wide window sills.

'Yes,
very neat, very tidy was the late Mr Smith.'

'Was
he like that as a copper too?'

'He
sure was. A very capable detective. Of the last generation rather than ours,
I'd say, but a meticulous, careful operator.'

'Why
did he pack it in?'

'Money,
he said. He took the pension and went to a bloody good private-sector job. I
guess too that he knew he had peaked at DCI.'

'But
if he was as capable as all that
...?'

'I
wouldn't have promoted him, though, and that was that. Horses for courses,
Andy.' He turned, separated two slats of the billowing blinds and peered out on
to the beach. 'Come on. Let's see what's happening in the mobile HQ.'

They
left the house, turned right and walked a few yards along the narrow pavement,
to the point at which Forth Street opened out on to a broad green area which
fringed the beach. The mobile operations centre, a high articulated vehicle,
had been stationed on a narrow strip of roadway.

'The
weekend sailors will love that,' said Skinner. 'The thing's blocking the
launching ramp for dinghies.'

'Tough,'
Martin grunted. 'For today they can use the other one, over by the harbour.'

A
dozen police officers, some in uniform, some CID, were milling around on the
street outside. 'What the hell's this?' the Head of CID asked a blue-jacketed
sergeant. 'A crowd scene?'

'We're
just waiting for Stevie Steele to allocate addresses for the house-to-house,
sir,' the man answered.

'When
did DCI Rose leave?'

'She's
still here, sir.'

'Jesus,
she's been here all night.' Martin climbed the three steps to the door of the mobile
HQ and stepped inside.

The
van had no windows; even at around nine on a summer morning, it was lit by neon
tubes. The light they cast made Maggie Rose look chalk white and emphasised the
dark circles under her eyes. She and Detective Sergeant Stevie Steele looked up
as the two Commanders entered; they had been leaning over a small desk making
up interview sheets into bundles, and attaching them to blue plastic
clipboards.

In
another corner of the mobile office, Inspector Arthur Dorward and his assistant,
Detective Constable Sharma Ghosh, stopped work on their report and stood up.

'Relax,
for God's sake,' said Skinner. 'Sit down, Arthur, sit down all of you. Mags,
you look puggled. Finish what you and Stevie are doing, give me a run-down,
then get off home.'

The
DCI frowned. 'I was planning to grab a couple of hours' sleep in the North
Berwick office, then get back to look at the results of the door-to-door
interviews.'

'You
can't drive yourself that hard, for God's sake. If Brian Mackie was here, you
and he would be splitting rest periods.'

'But
he isn't here, boss. Look, is this a divisional investigation or are you and
the DCS taking over command?'

Skinner
raised a hand. 'Hey, I'm little more than a spectator here.'

Beside
him, Martin shook his head. 'You're in charge, Maggie. We're here to offer help
and support, that's all.'

'Very
good. Then I'll do it my way.' She smiled; a thin, half-grin. 'Besides, I've
co-opted my husband. Mario says that since his weekend's buggered anyway, he
might as well come out to help.'

'That's
not inappropriate,' Skinner murmured. 'He's Head of Special Branch, the job
Alec Smith used to hold. We may need his input from that angle before we're
done with this one. Okay, you two finish up, while we talk to Arthur.'

He
and the Head of CID crossed the room to Dorward's table, which was larger than
the other. It was piled with papers and notebooks, and in one corner sat a
television monitor, connected by a cable to the dead man's video camcorder.

'What
did you find in the house, Arthur, apart from that?' asked Martin.

'Nothing
I didn't expect to find, sir. Loads of the victim's fingerprints
...
we lifted them for comparison before
the body was taken away. There was another set too, all over the house, but I
wouldn't get too excited about that. They were at their heaviest in the
kitchen, and we found some on the Domestos and Flash bottles and on the Hoover,
so my best guess is that he had a cleaning lady.

'The
front door was unlocked, and there was a good palm print on the outside. I'm
guessing that it might belong to the guy who found the body.'

'Whatever
happened to Alec's dog?' The Head of CID murmured.

'It's
at North Berwick nick,' Rose answered. 'When we arrived it wouldn't let anyone
near the body, so a couple of the boys took it away.'

'I'm
sure we'll find it a home,' said Skinner. 'What else, Arthur? No obvious
weapon?'

'Only
one, sir. There were plenty of objects that could have been used to inflict the
head injuries - there's a whole range of tools down in the cellar - but they
were all absolutely clean. We did find a blowlamp, down there, but there's no
chance that it was the one used on Mr Smith. It was stone cold and it had a
full gas-fuel cylinder. The cellar door was open too, sir. It was very slightly
ajar and there were footprints leading to the ladder that goes down to the
beach. It looks as if that was the perpetrators' exit route, right enough.' 'I
take it we're—'

Rose
read the DCC's mind. 'I had uniformed officers begin a search of the beach as
soon as the light was good enough, Boss. The trouble is, though, there was a
high tide last night, so if the killer did discard something, he probably threw
it in the sea. It might be difficult to definitely tie anything we do find to
Alec's house.'

Skinner
grunted agreement, then looked at the scene-of-crime inspector. 'Write up a
provisional report as quick as you can, Arthur, and let DCI Rose have it.'