Natural Causes (5 page)

9

McLean decided he didn't like Tommy McAllister within two minutes of meeting the man.

It didn't help that neither of his two assigned officers were about when he had extricated himself from the superintendent's office. He'd wasted several minutes searching for them before remembering he'd told them to interview the earlier burglary victims. The station was almost deserted of uniforms, everyone seemed to have been drafted onto the Smythe investigation, but eventually he tracked down a young constable and persuaded her it would be in her interests to find him a pool car. She was standing in the corner of the room now, notebook in hand, visibly nervous. She'd have to work on that if she wanted to make detective.

'Can I get you some coffee, inspector? Constable?' McAllister slouched in a high-backed black leather executive chair he no doubt thought made him look important. He was dressed in a suit, but the jacket had been thrown over a nearby filing cabinet. His shirt was crumpled, sweat darkening the cotton around his armpits. Loosened tie and rolled up sleeves gave the impression that he was relaxed, but McLean could see the nervous darting of his eyes, the way he played with his fingers and bounced his feet.

'Thankyou, but no,' he said. 'We shouldn't be long here. I just wanted to clear up a few facts about the house in Sighthill. Is Mr Murdo here?'

A scowl passed across McAllister's face at the mention of the name. He leant forward, hitting a button on the ancient intercom on his desk.

'Janette, can you put a call out for Donnie.' He lifted his finger off the button and looked back up at McLean, jerking his head backwards to the window behind him. 'He's out in the yard somewhere, I think.'

A woman's voice, muffled by the glass, announced over the tannoy for Donnie Murdo to come to the office. McLean looked around the room, seeing nothing that looked particularly out of place. It was cluttered, overstocked with filing cabinets. Safety notices, bills, post-it notes and other detritus covered the walls. One corner was piled up with tripods, striped poles and other surveying equipment.

'Who owns the house?' McLean asked.

'I do. Bought it for cash.' McAllister settled back into his chair, a look of something like pride on his weathered face.

'How long have you owned it?'

'About eighteen months, I'd say. Janette could give you the full details. It's taken long enough to get planning through. Time was you could do pretty much what you wanted, if you knew the right people to talk to. But now it's all committees and reviews and appeals. It's getting so a man can hardly make a living, if you know what I mean.'

'I'm sure I do, Mr McAllister.'

'Tommy, please, inspector.'

'Who did you buy the house from?'

'Oh, some new bank that's just set up in the city. Mid Eastern Finance, I think they're called. I don't really know why they wanted to sell it. Probably decided it was time to get out of property and back into shares. Don't think they'd owned it long themselves.' McAllister leaned forward again, jabbing the intercom button. 'Janette, can you dig out the paperwork on Farquhar House.' He didn't wait for a response.

'It's a bit of a change of direction for you, isn't it, Mr McAllister,' McLean said. 'Renovating an old house, I mean. You made your money putting up all those boxes in Bonnyrigg and Lasswade didn't you?'

'That's right, aye. Good times they were. But it's getting that hard to find cheap development land round the city these days, ken? People moan about us ruining the countryside, then they complain about house prices going through the roof. You can't have it both ways, can you inspector. Either we build more houses, or there's no' enough for everyone and the price goes up.'

'Then why not knock down that old house and put an apartment block in its place?'

McAllister looked like he was about to answer, but a tap at the door stopped him. It opened and a surly-faced man stood uncertainly in the doorway.

'Come in Donnie, have a seat. Don't be shy.' McAllister didn't get up. Donnie Murdo looked at McLean, then at the constable, a trapped expression on his face. He was a man who had come up against the law many times before in his life. He held himself defensively, shoulders hunched, arms hanging loose at his sides, legs slightly flexed as if ready to run at the slightest prompting. His hands were huge and across his knuckles faded tattoos read 'LOVE' and 'HATE'.

'Here's the file you wanted, Tommy.' The secretary who had shown them in earlier bustled past and laid a thick folder down on the desk. She looked at McLean with silent disapproval, then stalked out of the office, closing the door behind her.

'You were working at the old house in Sighthill the night before last, Donnie?' McLean watched as the foreman's eyes darted across to his boss. McAllister was sitting upright now, his arms resting on his desk. The nod was almost imperceptible.

'Aye. Ah wiz there right enough.'

'And what exactly were you doing there?'

'Well, we wiz clearing oot the basement, see. Goin' tae put a gym doon there.'

'We? I thought you said you were alone when you discovered the hidden room.'

'Aye, well, ah wiz. True enough. The lads were helpin oot earlier, like. But ah sent them hame. Ah wiz jest cleanin' up like. Finishin' the job so's they could get started on the plasterin' in the morning.'

'It must have been quite a shock, seeing the body like that.'

'Ah didnae see much, ken. Jest a hand is all. That's when ah called Mr McAllister here.' Donnie inspected his hands, picking at his fingernails, eyes down so as not to have to make contact with anyone in the room.

'Well, thank you Donnie. You've been very helpful.' McLean stood, offering his hand to the foreman, who looked momentarily startled, then took it.

'Is there anything else I can do for you, inspector?' McAllister asked.

'If I could get a copy of the title deeds, it would be useful. I need to try and track down who owned that house when the poor girl was murdered.'

'It's all in there. Take it, please.' McAllister motioned towards the file with an upturned palm, but didn't get out of his chair. 'If it's no' safe with the polis, then where is it safe, eh?'

McLean picked up the file and handed it to the constable.

'Well, thank you for your co-operation, Mr McAllister. I'll make sure you get this back as soon as possible.'

He made to leave, and only then did McAllister stand. 'Inspector?'

'Mr McAllister?'

'You wouldn't know when we can get back onto the site now, would you? Only we've had enough delays with the project as it is. It's costing me money every day now, and we can't do anything.'

'I'll have a word with the forensic people. See what we can do. It shouldn't be more than a day or two more, I'm sure.'

Outside, McLean climbed into the passenger seat of the pool car, letting the constable drive. He didn't say anything until they were on the road.

'He's lying, you know.'

'McAllister?'

'No. Well, yes. He's a property developer and they're always hiding something. But right now he just wants to get his building site back. No, the foreman. Donnie Murdo. He might have been in the cellar last night, but he wasn't working. Not hefting a hammer anyway. His hands were way too soft. Don't reckon he's done any hard graft in years.'

'So someone else uncovered the body. Who?'

'I don't know. And it's probably not relevant to the murder, either.' McLean popped open the folder and started to leaf through the random jumble of legal papers and letters. 'But I intend to find out.'

*

'Don't you ever switch on your bloody mobile?' A fat vein pulsed at Chief Inspector Duguid's right temple; never a good sign. McLean fished in his jacket pocket, dug out his phone and flipped it open. The screen was blank; pressing the power button elicited no better response.

'Battery's gone again. That's the third this month.'

'Well you're an inspector now. You've got your own budget. So get yourself a new phone. Preferably one that works. You might even consider an Airwave set.'

McLean shoved the offending article back into his pocket, then handed the folder to Constable Kydd, the PC who had accompanied him to McAllister's building yard and who now looked like she wanted to escape before she was dragged into an argument between two senior officers.

'Can you take that to DC MacBride. And tell him not to lose it. I don't want to end up beholden to Tommy McAllister in any way.'

'Who's McAllister? Another one of your dodgy informants?' Duguid looked past McLean's shoulder at the retreating constable, no doubt wondering why she wasn't working on his investigation.

'He owns the house where they found the young woman's body.'

'Ah, yes. Your ancient ritual sacrifice. I'd heard. Well that should be right up your street, I guess. Rich folk and their unseemly perversions.'

McLean ignored the jibe. He'd heard worse.

'What did you want to see me about, sir?'

'This Smythe case. You've spoken with Jayne, I understand, so you know how important it is that we get a result, and fast.'

McLean nodded, noting Duguid's casual use of the chief superintendent's first name.

'Well, the post mortem's in half an hour and I want you there. I want you to keep on top of all the forensic information as it comes in; attack the problem from that direction. I'll be interviewing the staff, trying to find out who might have had a grudge against someone like Smythe.'

It made sense to split the investigation up that way. McLean was resigned to the fact that he was going to have to work with Duguid, and decided it would probably be best to try and get off on the right foot.

'Look, sir. About the other night. I'm sorry I stuck my nose in; it was out of line, I know. This is your investigation.'

'It's not a competition, McLean. A man's dead and his killer's walking the streets. That's the only thing that's important right now. As long as you get results, I'll tolerate you on my team. OK?'

So much for building bridges. McLean nodded again, not trusting his mouth to speak only the words Duguid should hear, rather than the ones he was thinking.

'Good. Now get down to the mortuary and see what your ghoul of a friend Cadwallader's come up with.'

*

Tracy the mortuary assistant looked up from her desk as McLean walked in. She smiled at him then went back to the game of solitaire on her computer.

'He's not back yet. You'll have to wait,' she said to the screen. He didn't mind, really. Watching dead bodies being cut up wasn't much fun at the best of times, but the building had air conditioning that worked.

'Did you get back any results on the dead girl yet?' he asked. Sighing, Tracy clicked off the screen and turned to an overflowing in-tray.

'Let's see...' She leafed through the mess, pulled out a single sheet of paper.

'Here we are. Hmm. More than fifty years ago.'

'Is that it?'

'Well, no. She was killed less than three hundred years ago, but because it was more than fifty years ago we can't pin it down any closer, I'm afraid. Not with carbon dating, anyway.'

'How's that work then?'

'Thank the Americans. They started doing nuclear testing in the forties, but the really big stuff happened in the fifties. Filled the atmosphere with unnatural isotopes. We're full of them, you and me. Anyone alive after about 1955's full of them too. And once they die, the isotopes begin to decay. We can use that to tell how long ago death occurred, but only back to the mid fifties. Your poor wee girl died before then.'

'I see,' McLean lied. 'What about the preservation? What was used to do that?'

Tracy shuffled in the tray until she came up with another sheaf of papers.

'Nothing.'

'Nothing?'

'Nothing we can detect. As far as the tests go, she simply dried up.'

'It can happen, Tony. Especially if all the blood and bodily fluids have already been removed.' McLean looked around to see Angus Cadwallader walking into the room. He held a small brown paper bag out to his assistant. 'Avocado and bacon. They didn't have any pastrami left.'

Tracy grabbed the bag, delving into it and pulling out a long brown baguette. The sight of it made McLean's stomach gurgle. He realised he hadn't eaten anything all day. Then he remembered what he was here for, and decided food was probably not the best idea.

'Are you here for any particular reason, or did you just drop by to chat up my assistant?' Cadwallader pulled off his jacket and hung it on the door, changed into a clean set of green scrubs.

'Barnaby Smythe. I understand you're examining him this afternoon.'

'I thought he was Dagwood's case.'

'Smythe had a lot of powerful friends. I reckon McIntyre would pull every officer on the force in if she thought it would get the case solved more quickly. Pressure from above.'

'There must be if she's put you and old misery-guts together again. Oh well, let's see if his remains yield up any clues.'

The body awaited them in the post mortem room, laid out on a stainless steel table and covered with a shiny white rubber sheet. McLean stood as far back as he could whilst Cadwallader set about Barnaby Smythe, finishing the job that the killer had begun. The pathologist was meticulous in his work, examining the pale, firm flesh and inspecting the gaping wound.