Torch (9 page)

‘Thought you
might,’ he smiled. ‘Best of luck.’

City of
Edinburgh Council had tidied up the housing scheme twice in the
past ten years. It had been a waste of time. New paint and pointy
roofs couldn’t cover the rot inside. The face was improved but the
soul had already departed. The wide streets could have housed an
articulated lorry either side. Residents of the more salubrious
parts of Edinburgh would have given their eye teeth for the
hundreds of parking spaces that lined the grid of houses. An
attempt had been made to install a heart when it was first built,
with a block that held a cinema, a church, a couple of shops and a
bookies. The cinema had turned into a bingo hall, the shops shut
except the post office and one determined butcher, who had
obviously been made of strong stuff, repainting his
graffiti-covered walls regularly. Rhona could make out the
sedimentary layers of expletives under the thin white paint.

If MacFarlane
was surprised to see her he didn’t show it. When he emerged from
the burned out building, Rhona fully expected MacRae to follow him.
She had steeled herself for it. But MacFarlane was alone.

‘I take it the
body’s gone?’ she asked.

‘An hour
ago.’

‘I’ll call in
at Pathology then.’

‘Suit yourself.
You know the Doc though. Not too keen on the West poking its nose
in our affairs.’

‘We’ve had
similar cases. It might help. Is MacRae involved with this one?’
The words were out before she could stop them.

MacFarlane’s
face was impassive. ‘Sev’s taking some leave.’

So Gillian got
what she wanted.

‘Want to take a
look inside?’

At least
MacFarlane took her seriously, Rhona thought, then felt bad. MacRae
had taken her seriously. They’d just sparked off each other like a
tinder box and dry paper. Together they could have started a fire
in a damp room.

There wasn’t
much left of this room. In a corner lay half a dozen cans and what
looked like the remains of bedding. There was an old-fashioned
stuffed armchair and the blackened bits of a kitchen table. Rhona
stepped round the charred remains.

‘Where did you
find the body?’

‘Over
there.’

MacFarlane
pointed at the far wall. The SOCOs had drawn the body outline
halfway up the wall, as if the victim had been propped against it.
The wall was heavily smoke marked and soaking wet from the deluge
of water but here and there lurid purple wallpaper was still
visible.

‘Did you find
the remains of any pictures?’ Rhona said.

‘Pictures?’

‘That might
have fallen off the wall,’ she tried again.

MacFarlane
shook his head uncomprehendingly.

‘I just
wondered what these were for.’

The nails were
six inchers. Big enough to support Salvador Dali’s Christ of St
John of the Cross. They stuck out rigidly from the wall, three feet
apart.

‘Did you see
the victim’s hands?’ Rhona asked. She dropped her forensic bag
beside her and flipped it open.

‘Hands?’
Obviously MacFarlane wasn’t sharing her thoughts. ‘The body was
badly burned. That’s all I know.’

Rhona pointed
to the wall near the nails. ‘Did your forensic team sample the wall
here?’

‘I don’t know.
I’d have to check.’

Rhona rubbed a
filter paper round each nail then dropped on the reagents. She
showed MacFarlane the pink result. By the look on his face,
MacFarlane was catching up.

‘I think he was
crucified before the place was set on fire.’

MacFarlane
hitched a lift back with her. She suspected he wanted to talk or
maybe make sure Dr MacKenzie would give her house-room at the post
mortem. MacFarlane’s excuse was he was short of squad cars and
wanted to leave two for the constables doing the rounds asking
questions of the residents.

‘I don’t like
my men in there without a getaway vehicle,’ he said.

He wasn’t
joking.

Rhona swung out
onto the main road, which had been traffic calmed with crazy paving
and big ugly bollards. A few struggling trees survived inside their
mesh cages. Yet the housing scheme’s setting couldn’t have been
better. Easy access to the ring road, an established shopping mall
nearby, a short car journey through Holyrood park to Scotland’s
parliament building and the city centre. Private housing was
already encroaching from the east, neat semis, toy houses in red
brick with pseudo Georgian entrances.

MacFarlane took
his time. They were nearly at the Pathology Lab before he asked her
why she’d come back.

She told him
about her conversation with DI Wilson, the contaminated cocaine and
the burn marks on the Glasgow boy’s wrists.

‘So we go one
better, and nail ours to the wall?’ MacFarlane said grimly.

‘Edinburgh
always has to go one better. It’s traditional.’

MacFarlane
looked thoughtful. A spate of drug-related deaths linked by fire.
But nothing to do with the city centre fires, which were
potentially more disastrous. Rhona asked who was dealing with
them.

‘No one. Sev’s
off and Gallagher’s still in hospital.’

‘So why was I
sent away?’

No answer.

She pulled over
on a double yellow line.

‘It was MacRae,
wasn’t it?’

MacFarlane
hesitated. ‘Sev thought you’d be safer in Glasgow.’ He looked
uncomfortable.

‘I would never
have left if I’d known.’

‘That’s why he
did it.’

They were
causing a traffic jam on the narrow road. She indicated and drew
out.

‘What happens
now?’

‘We continue
our enquiries and hope we’re wrong about the timing.’

‘You’ll let the
Hogmanay party go ahead?’

‘We have no
choice.’

It seems you
didn’t cancel the biggest New Year Party in the world on the
strength of a unsubstantiated threat. Rhona changed tack.

‘What made
MacRae think I was in danger?’

‘There was a
letter after the fire at his house. It mentioned your name.’

A fleeting
picture entered Rhona’s brain. A single red rose. A place setting.
The song on the ansaphone.

‘You okay?’
MacFarlane looked worried.

‘Of course I’m
okay,’ she said shortly. ‘What about Amy?’

‘Gillian took
her up north to her mother’s for a while.’

‘So what’s
MacRae doing with his leave?’

MacFarlane made
a face. ‘Probably drinking.’

The Pathology
Unit loomed up in front of her. Rhona drew into a reserved space
and switched off the engine.

The
pathologist’s voice had a war weary tone. Heat contraction of the
skin of a corpse often produced splits which might be interpreted
as tears or cuts inflicted during life, he told her. The
distinction between burns inflicted during life and burns inflicted
on an already dead body could be difficult, if not impossible to
detect at autopsy.

‘So you don’t
think he was nailed to the wall?’ Bluntness seemed Rhona’s only
instrument.

MacKenzie’s
pale blue eyes rolled upwards as if she had just committed a social
gaffe. ‘I didn’t say that.’

Rhona sought
refuge in MacFarlane’s encouraging look.

‘Dr MacLeod
took samples from around the nails we found in the wall,’ he said.
‘If this body wasn’t nailed to the wall, then someone else
was.’

The pathologist
turned his blue stare on MacFarlane.

‘The hands
could have been injured prior to death.’ The tone was grudging, but
the words were enough.

‘Do we know how
he died?’ Rhona asked.

‘Come and have
a look.’

MacKenzie waved
them over to the body. Rhona followed him with MacFarlane a foot
behind.

‘The thoracic
and abdominal walls are partly burned away, but the viscera are
largely intact and show no evidence of natural disease.’ MacKenzie
pointed at a basin. ‘Our victim’s last meal. The usual healthy
diet, pie beans and chips. Oh and there was vomit in the
oesophagus. The larynx, trachea and bronchi contained a large
amount of soot and the lungs and major blood vessels were bright
red.’

MacKenzie moved
further down the body with Rhona following. MacFarlane stayed where
he was.

‘As you can
see, the testes and external genitalia are burned away, but the
presence of a prostate and seminal vesicles confirm the body is
male.’

‘Age?’ Rhona
said.

‘The medial
epiphyses of the clavicles were almost completely fused so
twenty-one or more. The lack of atheroma in the coronary arteries,
aorta and other major vessels suggest he was certainly under forty.
A young adult male.’

‘Death by smoke
inhalation?’

MacKenzie
nodded. ‘Most likely.’

So whatever
torture he’d been through didn’t mean he escaped the terror of the
fire.

‘Any clue as to
his identity?’ she said.

‘The body is
too badly charred for visual recognition. However there were some
surviving items that might provide a clue.’

The pathologist
left the table and brought over a small metal tray for inspection.
The smell in the room was becoming oppressive. Much more of this
and barbecues would permanently lose their appeal.

‘Would it be
possible to establish the presence of thallium in the body?’ Rhona
asked.

The pathologist
was simultaneously evaluating the possibility of meeting her
request and the reason for it. ‘In a similar case in Glasgow, there
was some evidence to suggest the boy had been poisoned with
thallium,’ she enlarged.

‘Really? God
forbid that we should be following in Glasgow’s footsteps.’ It was
an attempt at humour, at least.

The pathologist
motioned them over to a side room to examine the contents of the
tray and left them alone. When the door clicked shut behind them,
MacFarlane’s sigh of relief matched her own. Rhona laid the tray on
the work surface and perched on the stool beside it while
MacFarlane tried to suck air in from the air conditioner that
whined above them.

‘Last time we
met it was me being sick,’ she teased.

‘And me taking
the Mickey.’

They exchanged
smiles.

‘Shall we take
a look at the victim’s prize possessions?’

Two small
earrings and a key with a metal tag lay on the tray.

‘Probably a
front door key,’ she suggested.

‘Not a yale.’
He picked it up and turned it over in his hand. ‘There’s something
scratched on the tag.’

The word looked
like ‘Robbie’. A name that meant nothing to either of them.

Later, as they
drove away, MacFarlane asked if she’d had any luck with the semen
found in the female victim.

‘It didn’t
match the letter,’ Rhona told him.

‘And we have no
way of knowing if it was rape or not.’

She shook her
head. ‘I’d like to see the letter with my name in it.’

MacFarlane
looked uneasy at the change of subject. ‘Forensic has it.’

It looked like
MacFarlane had been planning a visit to Forensic, but definitely
not with her in tow. It was obvious he was uncomfortable about her
being there at all. Severino MacRae had a lot to answer for.

Rhona tried to
look on the bright side. Hopefully the threatening letter had
reached Forensic without a sojourn in MacRae’s stale glove
compartment.

Chapter
15

MacRae hadn’t
moved from the flat in the last twenty-four hours.

Jaz glared at
the first floor window then headed to the corner café with the dog
at his heels. It had been a waste of time giving MacRae the drawing
and telling him about wee Mary. MacRae hadn’t done a bloody thing
since he’d seen him in the pub, except go on a bender.

Jaz bit at the
pie the waitress brought him and took a slurp of tea. He was losing
income arse-ing about outside MacRae’s flat waiting for him to come
out and get on with the job. He broke a piece of the pie and
dropped it under the table along with a handful of chips. There was
a scuffle then a wet tongue licked his hand. It was expensive
feeding Emps. Karen must have spent most of her earnings on the
dog, Jaz realised.

He spent the
rest of the morning selling the Big Issue and deciding what to do
next. He could take his drawing and description to the police
station. Ask to speak to MacFarlane. He didn’t hold out much hope
there. He would be lucky to get past the Desk Sergeant. As far as
the police were concerned, he was a low-life and always would
be.

A woman was
headed up the steps from the station and for a moment he thought it
was the lady scientist. When she got nearer Jaz realised his
mistake, but it gave him an idea. If MacRae wouldn’t do anything,
maybe she would. Jaz shoved the remaining magazines in his bag and
set off along Princes Street towards the West End.

When Rhona
called Greg at work, he told her there was no problem about staying
at the flat again. He wouldn’t be back that night, so she would
have the place to herself. She planned to call Chrissy and bring
her up to date, but decided not to mention the threatening letter
that MacFarlane had allowed her to photocopy, against his better
judgement.

At Greg’s, she
poured herself a glass of wine and ran a bath. She would have to
seek out MacRae, persuade him to come back on the case, Rhona
decided. MacFarlane had been loyal enough not to confess how
worried he was. MacRae might be the only hope of outmanoeuvring the
arsonist before he struck again. Lying in the bath, Rhona re-read
the photocopied letter.

The contents
showed a strong link between fire and sexual excitement. The author
also hated women. Karen’s genitalia had been burned before the fire
started. The arsonist had moved on. Setting a building alight was
no longer enough.

This was why
MacRae hadn’t wanted her around, she thought. Why he’d tried to get
rid of her at their first meeting. Why he’d got MacFarlane to
recall her to Glasgow.