Death in a Cold Spring (Pitkirtly Mysteries Book 9) (5 page)

‘I’d better take this outside,’ he said.

As he had thought, it was one of the officers from the scene of crime team.

‘It’s human blood all right.’

Keith staggered slightly and leaned against the wall of the house. He realised he had expected them to say it was pig’s blood or that of some other unsuspecting animal, donated by the local butcher. Human blood meant something bad had happened.

‘Human blood? Are you sure?’ He wanted to retract the question immediately because it was ridiculous. They wouldn’t have made a mistake about that.

‘But definitely not fresh,’ the officer continued. ‘We think it had been frozen and then thawed out. Probably from a research lab or blood bank somewhere. No indication that it was the result of foul play as such, although of course there’s the element of theft so you might want to pursue that... Are you all right there?’

Keith reminded himself he had already dealt with more cases of violent death in his fairly short career than most policemen came across in a lifetime, and said, ‘I’m fine. Anything else?’

‘The camera... We’re trying to get access to the cloud servers, but it might take a while. If you can find a local device, that would speed things up a bit.’

‘A local device?’

‘A phone, tablet or computer where the footage might be stored. Worth a shot.’

After filling Keith in on some other aspects of the forensics, the officer rang off. A local device. It reinforced his sense of urgency about catching up with the two artists. They could probably wipe their device clean if he didn’t get a move on. Might already have wiped it clean. But maybe the forensic people could retrieve the data even if they did that.

Keith returned to the minister’s study with renewed purpose. No more Mr Nice Guy. No more tea and biscuits.

‘I’ll need to make a note of everything you know about these two,’ he said, forgetting that the minister’s wife was also still in the room.

‘Who – Sammy and Craig?’ said Mr Cockburn.

‘But they’re such nice young people,’ said his wife. ‘I can’t imagine they’ll have done anything to interest you, Sergeant Burnet.’

‘I’m afraid my enquiries are confidential,’ said Keith.

‘Oh, of course!’ said Mrs Cockburn, and left the room rather abruptly.

‘Thanks for the biscuits,’ Keith called after her, but she let the door slam shut behind her and he wasn’t sure if she had heard him.

‘Women, eh?’ boomed the minister, rolling his eyes. He lowered his voice, maybe in recognition that Keith wanted to keep things as confidential as possible. ‘I’ll print out the database entry for you. It’s quite unusual – they insist on being known as only one artist between them. A bit like Gilbert and George, I suppose – except that Sammy and Craig are brother and sister, so that’s a bit different. They want to be called Sammy Craig. Not a bad name for a young artist. What do you think?’

‘Yes,’ said Keith, who had never knowingly wondered about what artists liked to call themselves. ‘Thanks,’ he added. He was grateful to the minister for riding roughshod over data protection and so on. Not that it probably applied in this case.

‘You’ll see that they still live at home with their parents. In Rosyth. A nice family altogether. Father works in an office at the dockyard, and mother does something or other with a local science firm. Very respectable.’

‘How did they come to be part of this Face of Pitkirtly thing anyway?’ enquired Keith, as they waited for the printer to creak into action.

‘Oh, the usual kind of thing. We circulated all the colleges, knowing we would need more talent than the local pool could provide. The two of them came forward with a very original idea. I was keen to support it – and so was Mr Wilson, of the Cultural Centre. Maybe you know him. An unassuming man, but a pillar of the community.’

‘We’ve met,’ said Keith in a massive feat of understatement. He couldn’t imagine Christopher having been all that enthusiastic about having some messy exhibit in his Folk Museum, but maybe the minister had caught him in a weak moment. ‘About this idea of theirs – did you know it would contain human blood?’

‘Blood?’ The minister reeled back in surprise until he bumped into a chair. ‘No, it had nothing to do with blood. It was one of those video art pieces. I just thought it would be very amusing. And interesting. Different.’

‘Yes, it was different all right,’ said Keith. ‘Not in a good way, either. Not at all amusing.’

‘You sound a bit grim, Sergeant Burnet. I hope this isn’t anything too serious. But then, I don’t suppose you’d be investigating it in the first place if it wasn’t. Silly of me.’

The printer had finished. Mr Cockburn silently took the pages and passed them to Keith, who glanced at the top page to make sure the print had come out clearly and then folded them into his notebook. ‘Thanks for this. If you happen to see them, please let us know.’

‘I hope you’ll catch up with them and that the matter can be resolved,’ said the minister. ‘I expect there’s an innocent explanation.’

‘I hope so,’ said Keith, although he doubted that anything about this would turn out to be innocent.

Chapter 5 Amaryllis can’t resist it

As Keith left the manse, Amaryllis pushed further into the cotoneaster hedge, wincing at the scratches she received as a result. She had taken what she felt was a mature and informed decision not to try and question Mr Cockburn herself, in the light of what Christopher had said. However, she had not ruled out the possibility of ambushing Keith and stealing his notebook in the hope he had made notes on his interview. If she had had the foresight to bring a balaclava with her – or one of these tentacled mask-hats she had seen on the internet recently – she might have disguised herself as a normal mugger, although she had an uneasy feeling that she was now too well-known to the police to get away with any kind of disguise.

She would just have to use the ultimate weapon – being nice to him. It went against the grain, but she didn’t see how else she was meant to find out anything.

Hearing him discuss the blood on his mobile just outside the front door had been a bonus, though. Human blood – hmm! Did that mean foul play had definitely taken place? Had someone staggered off to die in the car park, or even staggered as far as the harbour and fallen in the water? It was something else to think about, anyway.

She pushed a bit deeper into the hedge and eventually burst out into the next garden.

‘Good morning!’ said a woman who was coming up the path with a shopping bag.

‘Morning,’ said Amaryllis. ‘Must dash.’

She rushed towards the garden gate and out to the street. The woman hadn’t appeared to be upset or cross, but you never knew when the most polite and welcoming of people might telephone the police and report an intruder. Especially nowadays, when Amaryllis knew there were people who ran Facebook groups that specialised in seeing intruders where there weren’t any. Jemima had confessed to being unable to sleep at night after reading some of their posts. Amaryllis had advised her to resign from Facebook, although she wasn’t sure if that was even possible. She herself had no desire to share any of her activities with any so-called ‘friends’ and particularly not with the people at GCHQ. If they wanted to amuse themselves at someone else’s expense, they should watch reality television as other people did.

Keith Burnet was only just ahead. She would have to dawdle a bit to avoid catching up with him. Damn! That would give the pleasant-looking woman time to call the police.

Comforting herself with the knowledge that the police wouldn’t have time to do anything in response to the call until a week next Tuesday, if then, Amaryllis crossed and re-crossed the road to waste a bit of time, found Keith had disappeared and scurried towards the corner to see if she could spot him.

‘Oof!’ she exclaimed as she located him by running right into the idiot as he lurked just past the bend in the road.

‘You’re losing your touch,’ said Keith, laughing.

‘You’re right,’ she said in some annoyance. ‘I’d better practise a bit more often.’

‘It isn’t the same though, is it?’ said Keith with a sympathy she was almost sure was false. ‘You need the adrenalin surge you can only get from a live mission.’

She glared at him.

‘I suppose you want to know what the minister told me,’ he continued. ‘But of course I can’t possibly give you any information on the case.’

‘What if I asked you some questions and you confirmed or denied what I said?’ she suggested.

He raised his eyebrows. ‘That’s a bit old-hat, isn’t it?’

‘I’ll only find out some other way,’ she said.

‘I don’t think so,’ he said smugly.

It was a kind of challenge, and one that she couldn’t resist. She turned on her heel and started back the way they had both come.

‘If you get arrested, you won’t win the election,’ he called after her.

‘Oh, you never know,’ she said, mostly to herself.

It was a pity she couldn’t somehow combine electioneering with investigating...

Or could she?

She texted Stewie, her fingers flying over the keys on her phone so fast that she wasn’t sure if he would even be able to understand the message.

Why hadn’t she seen it before? Electioneering was a perfect cover for investigating. It gave her a watertight excuse for approaching complete strangers and asking them all kinds of stupid, apparently pointless questions. Amaryllis almost wished she had thought of it years ago. Only of course until recently she hadn’t stayed in the same place long enough to become part of the community or to consider representing it in the political sphere.

Half an hour later, once they had established that Mr Cockburn was safely absent, Amaryllis and Stewie stood on the manse doorstep clutching election leaflets.

‘Leave all the talking to me unless we go to Plan B,’ said Amaryllis. Stewie nodded, his mouth clamped firmly shut.

Mrs Cockburn opened the door. She frowned when she saw them. Not very appropriate for a minister’s wife, thought Amaryllis censoriously, but she said,

‘Good morning, Mrs Cockburn.  Are you interested in local issues?’

‘Oh! Yes, I suppose I am... Are you selling something? Only Clive doesn’t like me buying things at the door. Or even agreeing to buy them later. Or arranging to get the trees pruned. Or anything really.’

‘No. I’m definitely not selling anything. My name’s Amaryllis Peebles and I’m standing for the vacant seat on the local council. My aim is to represent people who feel as if they’re being ignored by the big parties. If I’m elected I’ll try to keep the councillors’ minds on real local issues instead of fighting for cynical political advantage.’

Amaryllis always paused at this point when speaking to anyone about her campaign, partly because she had run out of breath and partly because she needed to look at her leaflet to remind her of what she wanted to say next.

‘That’s fine,’ said Mrs Cockburn. She held out her hand for a leaflet. ‘Just leave this with me and I’ll read it later.’

Oh yes, thought Amaryllis, after you’ve used it to line the cat’s litter tray or to make papier-mâché for Easter decorations at the Sunday school. She moved to Plan B, giving Stewie a wink that she hoped would tell him what she was up to.

‘One key element of my policies is to integrate culture much more closely with the life of the community,’ she lied. ‘So, for instance, the Council might be able to run art classes at the Cultural Centre to foster young people’s artistic aspirations locally. Or music,’ she added hastily, not wanting to be too obvious. ‘Stewie here is a case in point.’

‘Oh, really?’ said Mrs Cockburn, glancing sceptically at Stewie, whose eyes were now slightly wild with panic.

‘I always wanted to be an artist,’ he said, enunciating each word carefully.

‘Yes,’ nodded Amaryllis. ‘But there was no way of nurturing his talent.’

‘Aye, that’s right enough, there wasn’t,’ agreed Stewie.

‘So at first he took to crime,’ said Amaryllis, ‘and then he saw the error of his ways.’

‘How did that happen?’ said Mrs Cockburn.

Amaryllis considered making up a story about Stewie finding God, but she thought she had better not diverge too drastically from the script.

‘He got the chance to do some painting after all. And then there was no stopping him. But he could have found his way to it much earlier if he had been given an outlet for his talent.’

‘Interesting,’ said the minister’s wife. ‘Pity Clive didn’t know about him when he was looking for artists.’

‘Looking for artists?’ said Amaryllis, trying to hide her excitement. At last they were getting closer to her true purpose in being here.

‘For his pet project. The Face of Pitkirtly. He’s had to get people to come all the way from Rosyth, in some cases, to take part. There just weren’t enough artists in Pitkirtly.’

‘So what’s the idea of the project?’ said Amaryllis. ‘Is your husband looking for a particular similarity between all the faces?’

Mrs Cockburn laughed. ‘Oh dear, no. It’s the variety he’s looking for, if anything. Variety in the way the artists interpret the theme, as much as anything... Amazing how many of them have chosen to depict dogs in various situations... Then there are the ones who like to express themselves in video. Fascinating. That would never have been considered art when I was younger. Of course we didn’t have all these smart phones and so on. It’s so easy now. In some ways maybe too easy...’

They all stood silently for a while, possibly thinking about the eclectic richness of contemporary art, or possibly not.

Amaryllis broke the silence.

‘Video? Do you know of any of the artists in particular who might use that medium? I think Stewie might like to talk to them about it.’

Mrs Cockburn gave Stewie a suspicious look this time. He was shuffling his feet and looking as if he might want to move them rapidly in the direction of the garden gate.

‘Mmhm. Video. I think that’s something Sammy and Craig were going to be having a go at.’

Amaryllis cheered silently. At last! It had been a struggle to get this far, but she felt almost as if she could see the finishing line, and perhaps even burst triumphantly through the tape. Or whatever the appropriate metaphor might be in art circles.

‘Do you know how I can get in touch with Sammy and Craig? Or one of them?’

‘Oh, they’re brother and sister. Inseparable. Always together. If you find one you’ll find both of them.’

‘I see. So do you know where they live, or anywhere else we might be able to catch up with them?’ said Amaryllis, calling up all her reserves of politeness.

Mrs Cockburn frowned. ‘I don’t know if I should tell you that... My husband wasn’t sure if he should even give that kind of information to the nice young policeman.’

Oh, go on, tell me anyway, thought Amaryllis, willing the woman to give in.

‘Well,’ said the minister’s wife, ‘I suppose it won’t do any harm to say that they live somewhere in Rosyth. At home with their parents. I can’t say any more than that.’

‘Of course not,’ said Amaryllis through gritted teeth. ‘You’ve been very helpful. Thanks a lot.’

She turned to leave.

‘Your leaflet?’ said Mrs Cockburn. She held out her hand again. Amaryllis more or less slapped the piece of paper into it.

‘Sorry,’ said Stewie in a small voice, creeping along beside her as she stomped along the street outside the manse.

She glanced at him and laughed. ‘It isn’t your fault that it was a complete waste of time. You did exactly what I asked you to do. I suppose I’ll have to find another way now...’

‘Do you want to deliver any more leaflets just now, or can I go to my other job?’ said Stewie.

‘It’s fine. Just get on and do whatever you do,’ she said.

‘OK,’ he said.

It wasn’t until she noticed he was heading for the church that she ran after him.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I’ve been doing a bit of work for Mr Cockburn in the afternoons,’ he said. ‘Putting up the pictures in the church hall.’

‘For the Face of Pitkirtly thing?’

‘That’s it.’

Amaryllis threw the remaining leaflets on the ground and stamped on them. Stewie watched in some alarm.

‘You idiot!’ she muttered.

Stewie flinched.

‘Not you,’ she added hastily. It was hard work trying to build up someone’s self-esteem. She guessed Charlie Smith often felt like that about his dog. ‘I was talking to myself,’ she said. ‘Wondering why I didn’t know that already.’

Stewie picked up the crumpled leaflets. ‘I’ll put them in the bin at the church,’ he said.

‘Can you see if he mentions Sammy and Craig?’ she asked. ‘Tell me if he gives anything away about where they’ve gone or what they’re doing.’

She had no confidence either that the minister would say anything about the two artists, or that Stewie would remember to tell her, but at least having a spy in his camp made her feel a bit better. If you could count Stewie as any kind of a spy.

Amaryllis was scuffing her toes and muttering to herself when Jock McLean and the wee white dog caught up with her on the High Street.

‘Come on, Hamish... Why aren’t you out canvassing then?’

‘I’ve had enough of that for today,’ said Amaryllis, bending to pat the dog. ‘I’m not going to bother with this investigation, either. It’s a waste of my time.’

‘That’s not like you. Are you sure you’re not catching something? Jemima was telling me there’s shingles about at the old crinklies’ lunch club.’

‘It isn’t really called that, is it?’ Amaryllis smiled despite herself.

‘Shingles? It always has been, as far as I know.’ Jock looked at his watch. ‘Bit early for a pint. Do you want to go down to the sea front and mingle with the other dog walkers?’

‘That sounds like a waste of time too.’

‘Oh, it isn’t,’ he assured her. ‘That’s where you find out all you need to know about this town. There’s nothing like dog walkers for sharing the gossip.’

‘Why didn’t I know that already?’ said Amaryllis crossly.

‘You’ve never been a dog walker, have you?’

‘Not knowingly.’