Had MacMillan’s eyes failed him? Had he been blinded by the rain? If not, where could the Stabber have gone?
Gilchrist felt his gaze pulling back to The Pends. From where he stood, he could see the left of the arched entrance. But from the other side of the road, that support pillar would be hidden. Which would mean the converse was true – that someone taking shelter behind that pillar would not be able to see that side of the street.
Gilchrist’s mind crackled with possibilities. What if the Stabber had not turned into North Street, but slipped across the road, as he was doing now, then into the lane that paralleled the Abbey wall and continued toward the hill overlooking the harbour? That would mean he was backtracking, completing the circle around the Abbey ruins and heading back toward the scene of the murder where Granton’s body lay.
Gregory Lane, on the other hand, ran almost perpendicular to North Street, down to the cliff front, a six-foot-high stone wall on one side, a combination of gable ends, walls and gates on the other.
Had the Stabber escaped down this lane?
MacMillan’s natural instinct would have been to seek shelter in the lee of the stone wall. The storm had come in over the Eden Estuary, and with the rain in his face he would have been hard put to see the murderer slipping into the lane.
Enlivened by that possibility, Gilchrist entered Gregory Lane. Along the left wall, he noticed the indentation of two gates, one near North Street, the other close to the exit at the cliff pathway. On the right, the lane formed the short side of a triangular complex of terraced houses and open courtyards. Had the Stabber gone into one of these houses? Or through one of the gates? Or used the lane as a shortcut to the cliffs? Or was Gilchrist’s theory just a theory, and seriously flawed?
As he walked along the lane, Gilchrist felt hesitant, like a child creeping through a forbidden room. His sixth sense was telling him something. Beware, it whispered. You are close. When he emerged at the far end of the lane, he crossed the asphalt path and gripped the metal railing that ran the length of the cliff face.
Sixty feet beneath him, sea rocks glistened dark and wet. Gulls drifted by on invisible trails of wind, heads turning as if searching for their nests in the rocky face. The tuneless clamour of bagpipes came at him on the breeze. By the ancient ruins of Culdee Church, a lone piper paced back and forth. The sight of Scottish busking at its most ethnic brought a smile to Gilchrist’s lips.
He spent the next thirty minutes investigating the residential complex bounded by Gregory Lane, the Abbey wall and the cliff path. It seemed to him that the courtyards were too open, windows from one house backing onto another, providing no privacy or obscurity, even at night.
He approached the ruins of the Castle, focusing on the houses that overlooked the sea. He ambled like a tourist interested in local architecture. He took in the glistening paintwork, the washed steps, even ventured up to the windows and capped his hand to his brow as he peered inside. A thin face with hollowed cheeks reflected back at him, making him think that perhaps the pressure of work had indeed overtaken him. Maybe Patterson was right. Maybe someone with fresh input would solve the case in a matter of minutes. Maybe pigs would fly.
Most of the houses looked empty, but the shiver of a curtain in a downstairs window caught his eye. A ceramic nameplate announced the resident as McLaren. He gave a quick rap.
A woman in her fifties wearing an apron powdered flour-white opened the door.
‘Mrs McLaren?’
‘Yes?’ she asked, with more than a hint of impatience.
‘I’m Detective Inspector Andy Gilchrist of—’
‘I’m in the middle of baking.’
‘I won’t keep you long.’
She yielded with a sigh. ‘I suppose it’s that young one you’ll be wanting to talk to then.’
Inside, the warm smell of baking reminded Gilchrist of Saturday mornings at home as a boy. Mrs McLaren tilted her head to the ceiling and shouted, ‘Ian. Come down here.’ She glanced back at Gilchrist. ‘God knows what’ll become of that lad. Does nothing but sleep all day. Then when it’s time to go to bed, he goes out.’
‘Was he out last night?’
‘In all that thunder and lightning? Not a chance. He’s more scared of getting wet than that cat of hers next door.’ She stomped into the kitchen. ‘Ian,’ she shouted again. ‘Get yourself down here. Right this minute. It’s the police here to see you.’
Gilchrist heard a stampede of thuds down the stairs.
‘What is it, Mum?’
A teenager stood in the kitchen doorway, barefoot and stripped to the waist. Ribs corrugated his sides. A tattoo of sorts stained his left biceps. Denim jeans that seemed to defy gravity covered stick legs.
‘This is the police, Ian. Tell him.’ Mrs McLaren, her back to Gilchrist, sprinkled flour over a wooden board and banged her rolling pin onto the work surface. ‘And don’t go telling lies, now. Do you hear me?’
Gilchrist tried to soften his manner. ‘What do you have to tell me, Ian?’
The boy rubbed his upper arms. ‘Nothing,’ he said.
The rolling pin thumped onto the wooden board.
‘It might be warmer in the living room,’ Gilchrist said, sure that the boy would not talk freely with his mother close by.
Gilchrist took a chair by a tiled square on the wall, all that remained of the original fireplace. An electric fire with a wood-stained top centred the hearth.
The boy stood by the chair opposite.
‘Would you like me to put the fire on, Ian?’ Gilchrist asked.
Ian shook his head.
‘You’re shivering.’
‘I didnae start it.’
Gilchrist almost frowned. ‘I didn’t say you did.’
‘He hit me first.’
‘Self-defence, was it?’
‘Aye.’
‘And where and when did this fight take place?’
The boy grimaced. ‘Outside the Whey Pat. Last Friday, like. I’ve already been up at the Police Station.’
Gilchrist saw no bruises. Probably a minor tussle. ‘Did you win?’ he asked.
The boy’s fists clenched, then relaxed. ‘Aye.’
‘I’m not here to talk about the fight, Ian. I want you to tell me where you were last night.’
‘Upstairs.’
‘All night?’
‘Aye.’
‘Not go out at all?’
Ian shook his head. ‘It was raining. I cannae stand the rain. I cannae stand this place.’
Gilchrist was not sure if he was talking about his home, the town, Scotland, or all of the above.
‘What did you do all night, Ian?’
‘Played my guitar until it got light. Then I went to sleep.’
Gilchrist nodded. As a boy he had taught himself a few chords, but felt embarrassed singing. He found more pleasure in writing songs, though he hadn’t tried to sell any, never even knew he could.
‘Have you asked her next door?’ the boy was saying.
‘Who’s
her
?’
‘Lex Garvie.’
‘Lex? She a friend of yours?’
‘No.’
Gilchrist leaned forward. ‘Why should I ask her?’
‘She keeps odd hours.’
‘Does she?’
‘Aye. And I know for a fact she was up late last night.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I seen her.’
‘Where?’
‘Out the back.’
‘In the storm?’
‘Aye. After midnight.’
‘Doing what?’
‘It looked like she was feeding that stupid cat of hers.’
Gilchrist frowned. ‘What’s stupid about the cat?’
Ian shrugged. ‘They say she’s a witch.’
‘The cat?’
‘No, Lex Garvie.’
‘Who says she’s a witch?’
‘Just some of my friends.’
‘Not the ones you fight with?’
‘No.’
‘They play the guitar, too?’
‘Not all of them. Tam plays the drums. He’s dead good, so he is.’
‘What makes them think she’s a witch?’
‘Just stuff.’
‘What sort of stuff?’
Another shrug.
‘I see,’ said Gilchrist.
‘You dinnae believe me. I can tell.’
‘I’m too old to believe everything I hear first time now, Ian. Growing older makes you cynical.’ Gilchrist waited, but the boy offered nothing more. ‘I’ll look into what you’ve told me, Ian. You’ve been extremely helpful.’
‘Can I go now?’
‘Back to bed?’
‘I was listening to music.’
‘Sure.’
Gilchrist returned to the kitchen.
Mrs McLaren told him she had watched television, to drown out
thon racket
from upstairs, then taken a sleeping pill and gone to bed. There was no Mr McLaren. He had died in a fishing accident seven years earlier. Gilchrist thanked her for her time and declined her invitation to try her Madeira cake.
‘Are you sure you cannae be tempted? It’s straight from the oven.’
‘Positive, Mrs McLaren.’
‘If that’s the way you feel, then.’
Outside, the wind had risen. Gilchrist switched on his mobile. He had missed a call. Jack’s number flashed up.
At last. His son had finally deigned to call.
But Gilchrist had too much on his mind to call straight back. Something was niggling him about Nance’s comment.
From a distance, a woman might be mistaken for a man.
Is it possible MacMillan saw a woman?
Gilchrist was intrigued to meet the witch next door.
Sebbie stepped onto the West Sands, an expansive stretch of beach that rippled to the sea. He crossed puddles that glinted as dull as pewter, his worn trainers casting shallow prints that welled like his mother’s eyes. He reached the shoreline and breathed in the smell of salt, the faint stench of seaweed. A breeze bristled his hair and sent a shiver through him.
The tide had turned. The sea was creeping shoreward.
He scuffed the damp sand. It was here on the West Sands that his father’s body had been found. The memory of that day seemed unreal now. But the sand was real. The sea was real. The air that chilled his lungs was real. His loneliness was real, too.
With his toe he sketched a human shape and remembered how his father had lain there, his flaccid skin as white as milk, his body emptied of blood through the red gash in his neck. Water lapped at Sebbie’s feet and the advancing tide obliterated his imprint of his father’s left leg, then dribbled along the ruts in the sand, taking the left hand next, then the arm. Two minutes later there was nothing left.
Even when the sea splashed his toes, Sebbie did not move. Not until a wave lapped over his ankles.
Further up the beach, he kneeled, scooped a handful of damp sand, ignored the wind, the cold and the advancing waters. Within a couple of minutes he had dug a hole some twelve inches deep, its shallow sides collapsing from seeping water. He pulled off his trainers and crammed them into it, his fingers like metal tines, scraping deep into the liquid bottom. He pushed sand back in and flattened and patted the surface until all that remained was an area smoothed of ripples, darker than the surrounding sand.
As the waters edged over his covered spot, it struck him that his symbolic tribute had exorcized the sense of loss he had harboured since the day his father’s body had floated in on the surf three years earlier.
By that simple action, some burden had been lifted. And he saw then that he needed to pay tribute to his mother, but a different type of tribute, a get-even type of tribute.
Someone had screwed up the investigation.
Now that someone was going to suffer.
CHAPTER 9
‘Look after it for fifteen minutes, Cindy.’
Beth pulled on her suede jacket. As she opened the door, the pungent stench of Dettol caught the back of her throat. With an overpowering need to breathe in fresh air, she rushed across the tiled entranceway.
Away from the shop, she tried to recall what the man had looked like. She was no good with faces. Never had been. Names, yes. Which helped her in the shop. Customers liked that she remembered their names. It made them feel as if they were visiting a friend. But faces, no.
He had sent a CD rack crashing to the floor. Nothing had been broken, otherwise she would have had no hesitation in reporting the incident to the police. But something in his manner had upset her.
She had noticed his expression in a wall-mounted mirror as she reached for one of the wooden motorcycles. Since her summer vacation she had lost over six pounds, so her jeans were slacker than usual, and she had caught him leering down the gap at her front. She was certain of that.
But would any man have done the same?
Then she saw the answer in the memory of his eyes. They had scared her. Dark and fierce, as if they had no need to blink. And his hair. Matted, as if it had not seen a brush in months. His fingernails, too. Black with grime.