Deathly Wind (18 page)

The turrets and battlements of Dunshiffin Castle, the
thirteenth
-century stronghold of the MacLeod family, were lost in the mist as Torquil approached on his Royal Enfield Bullet. He stopped a hundred yards away and parked his machine by the side of the road and then advanced on foot. He had no intention of announcing his arrival, so he took to the grass verge and jogged along towards the bridge that crossed the moat. Unfortunately, there was no way of entering the castle by any other route, so he kept close to the walls of the gateway tower and thanked the mist for giving him some cover. Once in the gravel courtyard he stepped carefully in his stout Ashman boots so as to avoid announcing his presence.

On the way there he had stopped to call for back-up, but cursed when his phone failed to connect with any of his staff. He had thought of taking a detour to the phone box on the Arderlour road, but the sound of the gunshot when McArdle had called him had indicated the urgency of the matter. He knew that he would just have to use his wits and trust to the message he left in the voice box and his ingenuity.

There were no lights on, but one side of the large double front door was standing ajar. Torquil made his way towards it by following the courtyard wall and then climbing up the side of the steps to come at it from the side. He wrapped his goggles around the end of his baton and edged it into the doorway, using it like an angle mirror. Seeing nothing
suspicious
he crept through the door to stand in the hall as swirls of mist wisped through the door.

On the oak-panelled walls hung numerous stag heads, antlers, shields, with criss-crossed claymores and pikestaffs. On either side of the stairway leading up from the great hall stood empty suits of armour. Having been in the castle on numerous occasions over the years, as both guest and as a piper for formal occasions he knew his way about the place.
But the thing that led him at the moment in the chilly
atmosphere
was the unmistakable smell of a gun having been discharged. As he stealthily crept up the staircase, passed the larger than life size portrait of the Jacobite laird, Donal MacLeod the odour became stronger. He reached the top of the stairs where twin galleries ran east and west with doors dotted along them and corridors at either end leading off into the interior of the castle. And there the smell was very strong. Grasping his baton he headed for the west wing.

All of the curtains were closed and the long corridor was almost in pitch blackness, except for a line of light coming from a door at the end of the corridor. Torquil knew that this used to be the billiard-room in the previous laird’s day. He stopped for a moment to take off his boots and then crept softly along the corridor in his stockinged feet. As he did so he heard a click then a muffled thud, like the sound of a billiard cue striking a ball followed by it thumping into a pocket of a billiard table. It was then, as his eyes accustomed to the extra darkness of the long corridor that he was aware of a figure ahead of him, creeping along the wall towards the door.

He stopped to watch as the figure reached the door, seemed to peer through the crack, then gingerly push the door open. As he did so the smell of a gunshot mixed with cigar smoke seemed to grow even stronger.

Then a voice cried out from the room, ‘Don’t move a muscle, Cardini!’

Torquil moved swiftly on his tiptoes towards the door. Inside he saw the back of a man dressed in a smoking jacket bent over the billiard-table, as if frozen in time having just played a shot. Just behind him, a man was standing with his feet wide apart, arms outstretched, both hands holding an automatic weapon, pointed directly at the back of the other’s head.

There was no time for thought. Torquil was in the room in a couple of strides. With a swift upward strike of his baton he
knocked the man’s gun upwards, where it discharged with a deafening explosion, shattering a window. Then, moving swiftly before the man gained control of the gun, he brought the baton down sharply on the back of his head.

As the assailant fell face down, Torquil kicked the gun under the table, and then leaned down to turn him over.

He was surprised to see himself looking down at the unconscious figure of Vincent Gilfillan.

‘Thank God for the West Uist police!’ came Jock McArdle’s voice. ‘You know, McKinnon, I think you’ve saved me a job.’

Katrina looked round as a floorboard creaked as Morag and Lachlan entered the ruined lighthouse-keeper’s cottage. Tears were streaming down her eyes, but her voice was instantly authoritative as she moved into clinical mode.

‘He’s alive! But only just. Phone for Dr McLelland and get him to drive his ambulance down to the Wee Kingdom jetty.’

‘Who is it, Katrina?’ asked Morag, screwing her eyes up as she entered the dimly lit ruin.

‘My God, Morag, it is Ewan!’ gasped the Padre. His look of amazement turned instantly to anger as he saw the stout ropes about his ankles and his wrists. ‘Who could have done this?’

But Katrina was not listening. She had her bag open and was making a quick examination of the almost comatose police constable. He was in a state of collapse and utter squalor, having clearly soiled himself several times over the last few days.

Morag went outside for a moment and called Ralph McLelland. She returned with her emotions in a state of complete turmoil. She was so relieved, yet like the Padre, so angry that anyone could have done such a thing to her friend and colleague.

A low groan escaped from Ewan’s lips as Katrina went over his chest with her stethoscope.

‘Oh Ewan, I am so sorry, so very sorry,’ she sobbed, as she
slung her stethoscope round her neck and reached into her bag for an intravenous giving set and a bag of saline.

‘He’s dehydrated and looks as if he’s lost a couple of stone,’ she volunteered. ‘He needs intravenous fluids, cleaning up and a good work-up in hospital.’ She wrapped a tourniquet about his arm, found a vein and adroitly threaded a needle and cannula into it. With her teeth she pulled off the seal on the saline bag and linked it up to the cannula. ‘Hold that high would you, Sergeant?’ she said, handing Morag the bag, while she taped the cannula in place then applied a bandage around the site.

‘I am so pleased to see him alive,’ Morag said at last, tears steaming down her cheeks. She pointed to the large polythene water flagon on an old table with a tube that hung down near Ewan’s head. The flagon was empty but for about a few millitres of brackish water. ‘Whoever tied him up here
obviously
left water, but nothing else.’

‘And I guess they didn’t intend to leave him here as long as this. The monster!’ exclaimed the Padre. Then he turned to Katrina. ‘But how did you know he was here? You have probably saved his life; you know that, don’t you?’

Katrina bent down and kissed Ewan on the forehead. When she looked up her face was racked with guilt. ‘I didn’t save him, Padre. In fact it’s my fault that he’s here in the first place!’

Torquil looked up at the unmoving figure bent over the billiard table. He saw that although the figure was wearing a smoking jacket it was clearly not the stocky Jock McArdle. As he slowly straightened he saw that it was Jesmond, the butler.

A very dead Jesmond.

His cheek was actually lying on the table surface, his sightless eyes staring straight ahead. From his mouth a frothy trail of vomit had trickled over the green baize. Clearly he had not died a natural death, but his body had been arranged thus.

‘I can see why you look a wee bit shocked, Inspector
McKinnon,’ came Jock McArdle’s voice from behind him. ‘He’s not a pretty sight, is he?’

Torquil turned round and found himself looking down the barrel of a short-barrelled revolver. The laird of Dunshiffin was standing behind the door with the gun in his outstretched right hand and a cigar clamped between his teeth. ‘I never liked the little pip-squeak,’ he went on conversationally. ‘He didn’t really hide the fact that he resented me and my boys.’

‘And so you killed him?’

Jock McArdle shook his head. ‘Oh no I didn’t! It wasn’t me; he did it himself. He was showing me how he poisoned my dogs.’

‘And he did this while he was playing billiards with you?’ Torquil asked, sarcastically.

McArdle laughed. ‘You’re having a wee joke with me, is that right, Inspector? No, you are right. He croaked in my office and I carried him here to bait my wee trap. And it was working fine, until you came charging in like the seventh cavalry.’

‘It looked as if you were about to be shot in the head,’ Torquil said, equally conversationally. ‘As a police officer I couldn’t allow that.’

McArdle nodded. ‘Oh yes, I should be grateful, shouldn’t I? And if you had just hit him a wee bit harder you would have saved me a job.’

Vincent groaned and put a hand to his head.

‘But you see what I mean,’ McArdle went on with a deep sigh. ‘I’ll have to finish him myself.’

Torquil stood straight. ‘I can’t let you do that.’

Jock McArdle sneered. ‘You are hardly in a position to do anything about it, Inspector. In fact, I didn’t expect any of you flatfeet to arrive so quickly. It would have been convenient if you had come along afterwards, but as it is, I’ll have to dispose of you as well.’

Vincent was trying to roll over.

‘Just stay where you are Mercanti!’ he barked.

At the mention of the name, Vincent went rigid, as if a button had been pressed. He slowly turned to face the laird. ‘Cardini! You murdering bastard. I almost had you!’

Jock McArdle waved the revolver in the direction of the snooker table and the propped-up body of Jesmond, ‘Actually, I’m afraid not, pal. You fell into my trap, hook, line and sinker.’

Torquil had edged slightly away from the table, but McArdle snapped at him, ‘Stay exactly where you are – both of you. This is a Smith & Wesson 360. It has a light trigger – which you might remember, Enrico. A quick move from either of you and I’ll cut you in half.’

Vincent looked up at Torquil. ‘He means it, Inspector. Don’t do anything stupid.’

McArdle guffawed. ‘Aye, Inspector. You see Enrico here – not Vincent as you know him – knows his guns. We were partners, you see. Comrades and punishers together.’ Then his semi-affable grin suddenly disappeared. ‘Until the little bastard betrayed me!’

Torquil nodded. ‘I know what you are saying –
Giuseppe Cardini
. I know all about you and the Dragonetti gang.’

Giuseppe Cardini stared at Torquil in amazement for a moment, then he laughed heartily again. ‘So you lot are not as stupid as I thought.’

‘And I know all about your prison stretch for culpable homicide, your petty little gang war and your change of name by deed-poll.’

Cardini pointed the gun at Vincent. ‘And how much do you know about Enrico here? He was supposed to be dead, you know?’

‘I know about the bullet riddled car in the Clyde,’ Torquil replied. ‘And I know that it was a piece of investigative
journalism
by Rhona McIvor that sent you to prison.’

‘The bitch!’ McArdle almost screamed. ‘I’ve wanted to get even with her for years, but she disappeared. It was only a few months ago when she started writing articles for the
magazines that I realized where she was. I wanted her to suffer. And I have the means to do these things legitimately these days. I wanted an estate in the islands and this place came up. A snip for me. It was as if it was all meant to be.’

‘And this wind farm plan, that was all part of your way to get even with her?’

‘Of course. The stupid old bitch didn’t recognize me after all those years.’ He touched his cheek. ‘Not surprising maybe, since I’ve had a spot of cosmetic surgery, but she was going blind as a bat. That made it easier.’ He laughed. ‘A wind farm! I ask you, why would I be interested in anything like that? It’s pathetic. Give me the National Grid any day.’

Vincent had eased himself into a sitting position on the floor. ‘You killed Rhona!’

‘Not me, pal. She killed herself all those years ago when she took you in. Tell us about it.’

‘Drop dead, Cardini!’ Vincent retorted.

There was a thunderous noise as Cardini took aim and shot Vincent in the foot. Blood immediately gushed out of a hole in his boot and he gasped as he writhed in agony. Torquil made to move to help him but the sound of Cardini tut-tutting halted him.

‘I said –
tell us
!’

Vincent’s face was covered in perspiration, but he gritted his teeth and tried to talk.

‘You were always a sadistic bastard, Giuseppe. That was one of the reasons I needed to get away. Rhona gave me the means of escape.’

Cardini snorted disdainfully. ‘Aye, she was a good-looking woman and we never suspected she was a journalist, a spy. She got herself a job as a cashier in one of Luigi Dragonetti’s betting shops, then gradually worked her way up to be a manager. That allowed her to get properly in the know of things. And that’s when she started shagging Enrico there.’ He spat on the floor by Vincent’s feet. ‘And that’s when he betrayed his family!’

‘Does family mean mafia?’ Torquil asked.

Cardini guffawed. ‘Naw! You’ve been watching too many Godfather films. Luigi Dragonetti was just a god. He was like a father to us – him and me. Before him we were just slum tinkers. He gave us respect and gave us lives.’ He shook his head and took the cigar out of his mouth. ‘I tried to be like a father to my boys, Liam and Danny.’

‘That’s rubbish!’ Vincent snorted. ‘Luigi Dragonetti was a sadistic sod who modelled himself on Al Capone. He used folk like us to punish people. He didn’t give a stuff whose lives we pissed on as long as he got what he wanted. Rhona taught me that.’

‘Then that was another reason for her to die! I hated that bitch for the five years I lost in prison.’

‘So was that your real reason for coming to West Uist?’ Torquil asked. ‘To arrange for her death.’

Cardini shrugged non-comittally. ‘That was the ultimate aim. But first I planned to destroy her. And it was happening too, until this bastard started killing my boys.’

‘Did you, Vincent?’ Torquil asked.

Vincent’s face was fast draining of colour as blood oozed from the hole in his foot to form a gory puddle on the floor.

‘No – and yes,’ he replied in a rasping voice. ‘I killed the first little sod, but I didn’t mean to. I just got so angry over that letter and how he talked to Megan. Especially when we were getting close. When I left Megan I waited for him to come back by the causeway. When I confronted him, man to man, he spat in my face.’ He glared at Cardini. ‘That was one of the things you used to do before you hurt people. Anyway, he tried to throw a punch but he was drunk and slow. I knocked him off the causeway, then I jumped down and dragged him to the pool.’

Cardini let out a howl of rage. ‘My boy! You drowned my boy!’

Torquil realized that Cardini’s temper was brewing up to volcanic proportions. He needed to keep things flowing for
the present. ‘So what about the other man, Danny Reid? Did you kill him too?’

‘I did. But it was because Rhona warned me about Cardini.’

‘That’s what she meant by CARD IN?’

Vincent nodded. ‘I knew that Cardini would have some sort of revenge planned for Sartori’s death. I saw the bugger sneaking into Gordon MacDonald’s cottage, planning to set it on fire. A warning to us. I recognized he was trying to provoke whoever killed the first piece of shit. So I stopped him and snapped his neck. And that’s why I left that message for him.’

‘Is that what the medallion in the mouth was all about?’ Torquil asked.

‘It was a sort of signature that we used in the old days,’ Cardini volunteered. ‘But that was when I realized that bloody Enrico Mercanti was alive and well on this piss-pot of an island!’ He laughed. ‘And that’s when I laid my wee trap for you. It actually worked out a bit earlier than I planned, but that TV woman forced my hand by giving me the opportunity to send out a message on Scottish TV.’

He raised the gun and Torquil slowly raised his own hand. ‘OK, McArdle or Cardini, whichever you want to be known by, it is time to give me that gun. I am arresting you both.’

Giuseppe Cardini looked back at Torquil in mock
amazement
. ‘You are arresting me?’ He guffawed. ‘I don’t think you quite understand. I am defending my property here. That bastard killed my boys, then he came here and killed my butler and tried to kill me too. I struggled with him and you, our heroic local flatfoot, rushed to help me, only to get
tragically
killed in the line of duty.’ He shook his head with mock sympathy. ‘There have been too many police officers killed while doing their duty and I will arrange with Superintendent Lumsden, my good friend, for some sort of local monument to be erected.’

Torquil was aware of a patina of perspiration on his brow, but he managed to keep his voice calm. ‘I said I will take that
gun now. I have to get medical attention for Vincent here. And, by the way, thank you for your confession.’

Cardini scowled and pointed to the gun in his hand. ‘I am the one in the driving seat, McKinnon. Now how about just saying your prayers.’

‘I don’t think there is a need for that,’ Torquil said, deliberately looking past Cardini at the open door. ‘You have got all that, haven’t you, Constable Steele?’

Cardini sneered contemptuously. ‘Nice try, flatfoot. Now say your prayers. Both of you!’

Calum Steele’s voice came from the open doorway. ‘I have it all on tape here, Inspector McKinnon.’

There was a click followed by a whirring noise, then Cardini’s voice said, ‘Now say your prayers. Both of you!’

In a trice Cardini spun round into a broad-based crouch, both arms outstretched and steadying the gun.

There was a sudden flash from waist height, followed by a burst of gunfire from Cardini’s Smith & Wesson.

But it gave Torquil the time he needed. He flew across the room, kicked the gun upwards and, as he did so, grabbed Cardini’s right wrist. They wrestled with the gun, and it scanned the room, spewing out two shots. Then Torquil managed to twist and bend Cardini’s wrist back on itself. There was the snapping noise of bones crunching as the gangster’s hand opened automatically and he screamed in pain as the gun fell to the floor. Yet Cardini had been a street brawler and he immediately threw a left at Torquil’s head. It was a shade too slow, for Torquil ducked and threw a straight left to Cardini’s abdomen; then, as Cardini doubled over, he hammered an uppercut into his jaw. It lifted the laird off his feet and deposited him unconscious on the floor.