House of Dust (13 page)

“Mu-mmy!”

The cry of the toddler, emphasis and rising intonation on the second syllable, cut through the raised adult voices. Administrator Raphael set her down and moved away.

I looked up from Lewis Hamilton's prone form to see Davie lift Maisie up and hold her so that she could see her mother. She immediately stopped wailing and studied the scene, a serious expression on her wet face.

Sophia was on her knees, manoeuvring the guardian's head to the side and checking the airway. “Turn him on to his side!” she said urgently.

I took hold of Lewis's left shoulder.

“Here. I'll help you.” Andrew Duart was by my side, the knees of his expensive suit buried in the gravel.

We pulled the inert body round gently, aware of the wound in the upper back.

“Give us some air!” Sophia shouted.

The crowd moved back slowly. I glanced up and, through a gap, saw the senior guardian talking in a very animated fashion to Administrator Raphael. Raskolnikov, Verzeni and Yamaguchi had formed a protective huddle around her. She gave the impression of being in control, but her face was ashen and her restless eyes showed how agitated she was. As I watched, the Oxford group was ushered away by Slick, a posse of guard personnel in attendance.

“He isn't breathing,” Sophia said, raising her head from Hamilton's face. “Roll him on to his back.”

I got to my feet as she started pressing on his chest, assisted by an ambulance-man who had just arrived on the scene.

Duart turned to me. “He's not going to make it.”

I let Sophia get on with the procedure but I knew he was right. Lewis had already left us, his normally rigid frame loose and his eyes glazed. In the cruel sunlight he suddenly looked his age, the air of authority that he used to project nothing more than a fleeting memory.

As Sophia straightened up and shook her head slowly, I said a silent farewell to the public order guardian. Lewis had been my boss before I was demoted and he'd given me a hard ride ever since; he'd even turned out to be as untrustworthy as everyone else who held power in the so-called “perfect city”, but at least he'd always tried to distinguish right from wrong.

Which was more than could be said for the bastard who'd shot him in the back.

We left Medical Directorate personnel to deal with the body and got out of the prison yard. Maisie was in her mother's arms, her body limp. She understood well enough that something momentous had happened in front of her.

“Are you taking her home now?” I asked. “She's far too young for all this.”

Sophia's eyes flashed ice blue. “I didn't expect someone to take a pot shot during the ceremony, Quint.” She walked towards her vehicle. “Anyway,” she said over her shoulder, “this is the reality of life in Edinburgh now. There's no point in hiding her from it.”

“Jesus, Sophia, she's one year—”

“Back off, Quint.” Sophia's voice was firm. “It's not your concern.” She started strapping Maisie into the child-seat in the official Land-Rover.

“All right, all right.” I stepped closer. “What was the cause of death?” I asked quietly.

She glanced round. “Can't you wait for the post-mortem? I'll be doing it shortly.”

“I have a feeling I'll be too busy to attend,” I said. That was true enough, but I also had no desire to watch Lewis being cut open on the mortuary table. “Was it the bullet?”

Sophia waved a small teddy under Maisie's nose and waited till she gurgled approval. “Did you notice anything strange about the wound, Quint?”

I nodded. “It produced a minimal amount of blood.”

“Quite so.” Sophia's face was stern. She'd switched from mother to medical guardian in the time it took her to straighten her back. “That can happen with high-velocity shells. But there was no exit wound, so I don't think we're necessarily dealing with one of those.”

“No exit wound means that the bullet's still inside him. We can get the ballistics experts to check it out.”

Sophia had a hungry expression on her pale face now. “I'll be extremely interested to examine that bullet,” she said.

“So will I,” I said as she got into the vehicle. “So will I.”

Davie came down the steps and past the sentries on the gate of the exercise yard, his expression even more sombre as he joined me by the kerb.

“What now?” I asked.

He glanced over his shoulder. “We're off the case,” he said. “The Mist says she's running it.”

I saw red for a few seconds then beckoned to him. “Come on, we're going to sort this out.”

He put a hand on my arm. “Hang on, Quint. It isn't safe up there.”

I started walking. “Whoever put that slug in Lewis is long gone, my friend.”

Raeburn 124 didn't seem to think so. She'd taken refuge in the sentry post and was making sure she was flat up against the circular wall of the old philosopher's mausoleum. The sun was blazing through the glass roof and the guardswoman on the gantry was tapping her foot nervously.

I went round the bank of screens and computer terminals manned by a pair of guardsmen in the centre of the building and put my face up to the Mist's. “We can have this conversation in front of your people or in the open air, deputy guardian,” I said in a low voice. “You choose.”

She preferred showing herself to the sniper to losing face with her subordinates.

“I've already told Hume 253,” she said, looking disapprovingly at Davie; he was examining the ground over by the obelisk with his notebook out. “I'm taking personal charge of the investigation into my predecessor's death.” She led me to the southern wall of the former burial ground.

“Your predecessor?” I said. “Have you been promoted already?”

The Mist's heavy features took on a pink tinge. “Well, not yet. But I fully expect—”

“Jesus Christ,” I said, leaning towards her. “Haven't you got a shred of respect for Lewis Hamilton? He's only been dead a few minutes and you've already taken over his desk.”

Raeburn 124 drew herself up and gave me a cold look. “The directorate's work goes on, citizen. Especially at a critical time like this.”

“You're bloody right it does,” I said, returning her stare with interest. “And if you think you're shutting Davie and me out of the investigation, you can forget it. I worked with Hamilton ever since I joined the directorate in 2007 and I'm not letting some fucker get away with killing him.”

The Mist smiled emptily. “You didn't exactly give the guardian your complete support at all times, did you, citizen?”

“That's nothing to do with you,” I said. “I'm going after whoever shot Lewis and you can't do anything about it.”

She pulled out her mobile. “Just watch me, Dalrymple.”

I put my hand in my pocket, came out with my authorisation and held it under her nose. “You can read, can't you? It says that I'm empowered to act without Council, auxiliary or citizen interference.” I'd been given those powers during a particularly bad case of corruption involving senior auxiliaries back in 2020.

The Mist stilled the movement of her thick fingers over the keypad. “That authorisation can be revoked easily enough.” I reckoned she would be pulling her friend the senior guardian's chain the next time she saw him.

“Only by the full Council,” I countered. “That was the agreement. Until you manage to convince all the guardians to go along with you, I'm taking the case.” I turned away, pointing to Davie as I went. “And he's working it with me. Keep out of our way.”

Her ironic reply followed me across the yard. “Enjoy it while you can.”

I resisted the temptation to give her the finger – but only just.

“What do you reckon then?” Davie was squatting beside the pegs that marked where Lewis Hamilton's body had lain.

I stood up and gazed southwards, shielding my eyes with my hand. There was a wide open space between the lower outcrop of the Calton Hill we were standing on and the buildings of the Old Town, most of it filled with the vast Supply Directorate depot over what used to be the station and the railway lines. “I reckon we're in the wrong place.” I started towards the gate. “Where have you got the search squads looking?”

“Everywhere,” he said, catching me up. “The Waverley, the Observatory Hotel on the Calton—”

“Your geometry's rubbish, guardsman. The shot came from the south.” I looked over the prison wire towards the pair of high buildings at the far end of the North Bridge. “Are you looking in that pile?” I asked, pointing towards what the Tourism Directorate had imaginatively named the Old Town Hotel.

“Aye,” he said, nodding. “A squad just went in there.”

“How about the knocking shop across the road from it?”

Davie beckoned to the driver in the nearest Land-Rover to get out. “The Skin Zone? Guard personnel should be there by now too. There were spotters in all those places for the inauguration, you know. None of them saw any sign of a sniper.”

I stared at him as I got into the guard vehicle. “Spotters? What do you mean?”

“Apparently the Mist put guard personnel on all elevated points around the burial ground.”

“Did she now?” I wondered about that as I put on my seat belt. It was almost as if Hamilton's deputy were expecting a shot to be fired. “Let's get up there sharpish.”

He nodded and slammed the vehicle into gear. We careered towards the checkpoint, the sentries hoisting it when they saw who was at the wheel – Davie's reputation for speed was second to none in the city.

Tourists outside the gaming hall in the former central post office at the end of Princes Street stared at us, jaws slack and hands grabbing for each other.

“They probably think we're late for our lunch,” Davie said, feeding the wheel rapidly between his hands and making the left turn on to the North Bridge with a couple of inches to spare. He glanced at me. “You think the shooter took the guardian out from the Skin Zone? There haven't been any reports of gunfire. It would have been a hell of a shot, Quint.”

I had the street atlas open on my lap. “Around three hundred yards.”

“Nobody heard it either, so the shooter must have been using a silencer.” He shook his head. “A hell of a shot is right.”

I watched as the tall buildings that formed a gateway to medieval Edinburgh loomed before us, the hotel on the left augmented by a couple of figures in guard uniform on the roof. On the right stood one of the city's premier brothels. The Skin Zone was reserved for the most affluent tourists, its luxurious premises housed in what had originally been the home of Scotland's national newspaper until the old building had been flogged off and turned into a hotel during the last, short-lived Edinburgh boom before the Scottish Parliament imploded. Although the multi-storeyed edifice with its foundations far below the level of the bridge had been completed at the beginning of the twentieth century, the effect of the façade's tall windows and turrets was more medieval than Edwardian.

“Why are you so interested in the Zone?” Davie asked as he pulled up outside the building. “Surely the shot could just as easily have come from the hotel.”

“Call it intuition,” I said, opening my door.

“Call it an unhealthy interest in female citizens of the night,” he said.

I stood on the pavement and looked up at the dark grey, dressed stone walls. A large white banner with the establishment's name in wavy red letters had been hung from the upper-floor windows. The hot metal of the newspaper's time had been replaced by hot flesh – another victory for the Tourism Directorate.

Davie nodded to the guardsman on the door and pushed it open. We were halfway across the entrance hall – marble columns, thick pile carpets and hazy photographs of half-dressed women – when we heard shouting from the staircase and exchanged suspicious glances.

“No, no, no!” said a high-pitched male voice. “You do not have the authority.” The accent was foreign, I guessed Middle Eastern.

“Then I must call my superior,” came the neutral tones of a female auxiliary.

“Don't bother,” Davie called. “Your superior's here.”

We met them at the foot of the stairs. The complainant was dressed in what looked to my untutored eye to be a very expensive cream-coloured suit, his shirt collar open to reveal a heavy growth of chest hair. He was peering at the nondescript guardswoman with extreme antagonism, dark eyes glaring above a hooked nose; the guy looked like a caricature of an Arab in the braindead British movies I couldn't avoid when I was a kid.

“Ah, Hume 253,” she said, relief flooding into her voice. “This gentleman, Mr . . .”

She glanced down at her notebook.

“Aldebran Mohammed,” the foreigner said. He whipped a business card from his pocket and held it up to us like a talisman.

“Senior Customer Service Executive, Aldebran Travel, PO Box 83006, Republic of Central Arabia,” Davie read out.

“Mr . . .” Napier 208, the guardswoman, either couldn't cope with the name or couldn't be bothered to try. “The gentleman has a client on the top floor. He refuses my team access to the room.”

“Yes, it is very private,” the tourist representative said. “My client . . .” His voice dropped to a whisper. “My client is a government minister.”

“Really?” I said with a slack smile.

“Yes, really. I can tell you that he knows the senior guardian.” The Arab nodded. “Everything fine now?”

I smiled again. “Very fine.” I turned to the guardswoman. “Napier 208, you are authorised to use all means at your disposal – including your auxiliary knife – to keep this gentleman out of our hair.” I walked past them. “Good to meet you, Mr Aldebran,” I said, receiving no acknowledgement. He was probably already formulating the abuse his client would direct at Slick. Great.