It had been good to announce Kasper Franzik had been arrested and charged, Fleming reflected in her office later. Slick operations boosted morale, and her Force would be more effective today as a result.
As usual, she’d kept it short, telling them Franzik had been arrested after a call from a householder alarmed by a prowler in his garage, and charged when his fingerprints matched some prints on the knife. She’d ordered door-to-door around the Stoneykirk area where they’d picked him up, and searches of bins and roadsides in between for the missing shoes – likely to be trainers, according to Pavany’s workmates. She had mentioned, as if in passing, that no other knife had been found on Pavany’s body, but since it was possible he had carried one it might have been thrown away.
Had anyone noticed how flimsy that sounded? She didn’t want to make her real reason public – that there was one major flaw in the neat case against Franzik which she was still hoping to argue away. Her team – MacNee, Macdonald, Kerr and Campbell – should arrive any moment, and she could only hope they’d brought their brains with them.
Last night Franzik, through an interpreter, had denied guilt, then clammed up, his dark eyes flashing hatred of his interrogators. Dishevelled and dirty after sleeping rough for two nights, he still looked romantic, as Karolina had said, in a mad-bad-and-dangerous-to-know Byronic way.
He certainly had a dangerous temper. He had flared up during their persistent questioning, and she had no problem at all with accepting that he was capable of stabbing his cheating boss.
There was just that one thing . . .
Jean Grant parked the old Vauxhall by the farmhouse door and got out with a basket of shopping from Ardhill. Her son, forking muck on to a trailer, didn’t turn his head as she slammed the car door.
She came across the yard. ‘Someone else been stabbed, they were saying at the shop. Dead, this time.’
Stuart still didn’t turn his head. ‘Oh?’
‘One of thae Poles. Do you know them?’
He turned to face her now. ‘Listen to me, woman. I’ve been thinking. If the polis come back, I’m not keeping quiet.’
Jean stiffened. ‘Oh yes you are! You’ll keep your mouth shut, like I told you. And if you don’t, that’s it. You lose the farm.’
He moved closer. She was a tall woman but he was inches taller, broad and burly. ‘The thing is,’ he said, ‘I got curious the other day, after the police were here. Something they said made me wonder and then I found a box under your bed, with a couple of interesting things in it.’
She took a step back, her face contorted. ‘How dare you! That’s – that’s private!’
‘Shouldn’t have been, though, should it? You’ve been using me, lied to me, again and again. All my life, practically. I’ve got them now, in a safe place.’
‘Give me them back!’
He smiled a sneer.
‘I’ll find them! And anyway—’
‘You’ll change your will? So what? I went to a lawyer yesterday, and he says whatever you say, I’ll get the bairn’s part – half the estate. That’s the law in Scotland. And once you’re dead, you were just a mad old biddy when you altered it anyway, weren’t you? After the way I’ve worked the farm for you I’d have no trouble at all in getting it set aside.
‘And if we’re talking about the law . . .’
Jean’s face changed. There was fear there now. ‘You wouldn’t do that, to your own mother!’
‘After what you did to my sister, this muck heap’s clean.’ He turned his back on her and went back to his task. Perhaps it was an accident that a lump of dung landed on her shoe.
It was Kerr this time who chose to perch on the table in the corner, while MacNee and Macdonald took the seats across the desk and Campbell pulled another forward to join them. Fleming had been concerned about Tansy recently, and this physical detachment from the group confirmed a suspicion that her heart wasn’t in it these days. She’d have to tackle that, even if today the last thing she needed was extra aggro.
She was pleased Campbell was back, though. What little he said was always sharply to the point.
‘I didn’t expect to see you, Ewan. That’s good. How’s the baby?’
‘Kind of noisy.’
Fleming laughed. ‘They tend to be. You get used to it, sort of.
‘Anyway, something emerged from the autopsy and I want your thoughts. As I said in the briefing, Pavany was hit on the head, then from a gash on his temple they reckon he fell forward on to the corner of something and was stabbed as he lay there. No evidence of whether conscious or unconscious.’
Nothing new here. They nodded.
The knife Fleming had taken into the briefing in its evidence bag lay on the desk before her, a razor-sharp blade with a Polish maker’s mark and a horn handle with brass studs. She held it up.
‘The kicker is, this wasn’t the knife that killed him.’
‘
Wasn’t?
’ MacNee exclaimed. ‘But—’
‘Found in the wound, yes. But look,’ Fleming indicated, ‘this has a curved blade. The knife that actually killed Pavany was longer and thinner, with a triangular blade. It was pulled out and this one, for some reason, inserted, not even far enough to reach the heart. The handle had been wiped, but they found Franzik’s prints on the blade.’
Again, MacNee was the first to speak. ‘According to the other two builders, Pavany had taken that knife off Franzik in a fight earlier. And those boys had grudges against him too.’
Macdonald gave a puzzled rub to his buzz-cut. ‘You’re not saying someone tried to frame him?’
‘I hope to God I’m not,’ Fleming said, ‘but obviously it has occurred to me.’
MacNee was thinking aloud. ‘If Pavany had Franzik’s knife in his pocket, one of them could have killed him with his own knife, then taken it out and replaced it with Franzik’s. Job done.’
‘But someone I spoke to definitely said those lads were in the pub all evening till closing time – midnight on Saturday,’ Macdonald argued. ‘Though I suppose they could have got him earlier – left him dead in the house, then dumped him at the pub once everything was quiet.’
MacNee shook his head. ‘Doesn’t work. Pavany was at Sandhead around eight, having a run-in with Gavin Hodge about payment.’
‘Everybody’s pal, Pavany,’ Fleming said. ‘Any other thoughts?’ Throwing ideas around with everyone participating was a useful exercise. If everyone participated. She looked pointedly at Kerr, trying to draw her into the discussion, but again it was Macdonald who answered.
‘Pavany had taken Franzik’s knife off him. So Franzik used another one, but maybe he had felt humiliated – losing the knife made him look helpless, a loser or something. So when he found it in Pavany’s pocket, he switched the knife he’d used. A revenge, sort of.’ He grimaced. ‘Just an idea.’
‘Certainly lateral thinking,’ Fleming acknowledged.
‘But would it convince anyone, that sort of psychological guff?’ MacNee was sceptical. ‘I can see his brief having a field day with that.
‘Any chance it was the knife that stabbed Lindsay? If we’d just had him on a slab, they could’ve compared the wounds – that would have been a help.’
‘I really don’t want to think you’re sounding regretful, Tam,’ Fleming said. ‘Maybe the surgeon who stitched him up could tell us something. But leave Lindsay out of it for the moment. It’s what happened last night that we need to focus on.’
‘You’d think he’d have realized the knife would incriminate him,’ Macdonald said.
Fleming sighed. ‘Yes, but with his temper, does he think ahead? Didn’t have much of an escape plan, did he?’
Campbell was frowning. ‘Anyway, how did he get the man there?’
‘Who where?’ Kerr made her first contribution, but the others looked at Campbell with respect.
‘Didn’t have a car, did he?’ MacNee said slowly. ‘Could hardly have wandered through Ardhill with a body over his shoulder.’
‘Might have nicked one and returned it,’ Macdonald suggested. ‘Half the time around here they leave them unlocked with the keys in.’
‘That’s certainly possible,’ Fleming said. ‘Any other thoughts? No? Thanks for the input, anyway. Mull it over, and if anything occurs to you come back to me. Now, assignments . . .’
As they were going out, she said, ‘Oh, Tansy – a word, if you don’t mind.’
Startled, Kerr turned. ‘Oh – fine,’ she said, and came to sit down, but it was with the sulky, slightly nervous air of a child who knows a discussion of unsatisfactory behaviour is on the agenda.
Fleming began mildly enough. ‘You didn’t seem to have a lot to contribute today, Tansy.’
A little shrug. ‘Didn’t think of anything someone hadn’t said already.’
‘You didn’t seem to be thinking much at all.’ There was a slight edge to her voice.
That was Kerr’s cue to apologize, but she didn’t pick it up. ‘I was tired. I didn’t expect to be on duty today. It’s my weekend off.’
Fleming raised her eyebrows. ‘How many years of service do you have? And you haven’t understood yet that when there’s an emergency we all get hauled in?’
‘Doesn’t mean I like it.’
Fleming was startled, then annoyed. She was on edge and exhausted herself, and she wasn’t about to take that sort of impertinence. She said coldly, ‘Constable, I think you have to rethink that response. Right now.’
Kerr flushed and sat up a little straighter in her chair. ‘Sorry, ma’am. But it’s just all a bit much for me at the moment.’
Perhaps the girl really did have problems. Fleming said more gently, ‘I have missed the sort of enthusiasm you used to bring to the team, Tansy. What’s wrong?’
After a brief hesitation Kerr said, ‘Well, to be honest, I’m just getting tired of missing out on things. I’d plans for today, and they’ve all been ruined.’
Suddenly, Fleming saw red. ‘It just might occur to you that the plans the victim probably had for today, and all the other days, and all the rest of his life, have been just slightly dented! For heaven’s sake, Kerr, you’re a grown woman, not a teenager, and until you’re ready to behave like one, you’re not much use to me on the team.’
For a long moment, Kerr said nothing. Then she got up. ‘I think that does it. I’ve been wondering whether I should stay in the Force, and I suppose I should be grateful to you for making up my mind.
‘Maybe I should have come to you sooner to talk about it, but I was scared you’d react just the way you have. I’ll be putting in my resignation.’
‘Tansy—’ Fleming said, then as Kerr waited, went on wearily, ‘Oh, nothing. You’ve clearly made up your mind. You’d better come off the team now, then – I can’t see you giving the investigation your best shot. OK.’
As the door shut behind Kerr, Fleming slumped in her chair with a groan. She hadn’t meant it to go like that. Tansy had been a valuable officer until quite recently, and if Fleming hadn’t been so completely wrung out herself, she might have been able to coax her into a better frame of mind.
On the other hand, she’d seen it before with young officers, male and female: if the job stopped being the most important and interesting thing in your life, you started minding about the things you were missing out on.
Like a normal family life.
When Marjory arrived back at Mains of Craigie, late, tired, and desperate for food and a glass of wine, she saw, to her dismay, that Karolina had been watching for her.
She came hurrying over from the cottage and approached hesitantly. ‘I don’t want to be a nuisance, Marjory. I know it’s late. Just, I wanted to know – have you found Kasper?’
Groaning inwardly, Marjory said, ‘That’s all right, Karolina. Yes, we found him, and I’m afraid he’s been charged with murder.’
To her surprise, Karolina nodded approval. ‘Good. He is a bad man.’
Marjory had never seen the sweet-natured Karolina look so savage. ‘Er – yes, I suppose he is. And of course, it is very sad about Stefan Pavany. Did you know him too, in Poland?’
‘No. He is not Polish, I think.’
‘Not Polish? But I saw his passport today.’
‘I heard him talking to Kasper, when he came to the filming that time. He speaks Polish like – you know, the way a foreigner speaks. The accent, I think that is the word. It is wrong. Probably, he has a false passport. You are surprised? They are not hard to get, you know.’ She was very matter-of-fact.
‘I – I see. Thanks, Karolina.’ Shaking her head, Marjory went inside. It wasn’t often Karolina made her feel unworldly and naïve.
The house felt very empty, without even Meg to welcome her. Bill had phoned earlier to say that they’d arrived safely and that Cammie, though badly shaken, was on the mend, and might even be cleared to fly home tomorrow. He’d spoken without warmth, though, and that had hurt.
She went straight to the phone now, and managed to speak to Cammie, but it didn’t make her feel any better. Yes, he was feeling OK, yes, they were looking after him fine, yes, the food was good, and then at the end, a rather bleak, ‘I thought you’d have come.’
The bloody job. Marjory was too tired to feel hungry at the moment; she poured herself a glass of wine and went through to the sitting room. The pleasant room, with the shabby chair covers and all the casual evidence of family life – books and magazines on the side tables, videos and CDs stashed below the television – seemed for once chilly and unwelcoming.