Cold Granite (22 page)

Council-owned housing surrounded the shops - three-and four-storey concrete tenement buildings thrown up in a hurry and left to rot. If you needed a home fast, had no money and weren't fussy, this was where you ended up.

A poster outside the grocer's next door declared: 'MISSING: P ETER L UMLEY' beneath a colour picture of the five-year-old's smiling, freckled face. Some wit had drawn on a pair of glasses, a moustache and 'R AZ TAKES IT UP THE ARSE'.

There were no community notices pinned up outside the Turf 'n Track: it offered only blacked-out windows and a green-and-yel ow plastic sign. Logan pushed through the door into the gloomy interior where the air was thick with the smel of hand-rol ed tobacco and wet dog.

The inside was even shabbier than the outside: dirty plastic seats in grimy orange, sticky linoleum with cigarette burns and holes worn al the way through to the concrete floor.

Woodwork so thickly impregnated by generations of cigarette smoke that it oozed sticky black.

There was a chest-high counter running across the room, keeping the punters away from the paperwork, the til s, and the door to the back room. An old man sat in the corner, a grey-muzzled Alsatian at his feet, a tin of Export in his hand. His attention was fixed on a TV screen with dogs screeching round a track. Logan was surprised to see a pensioner in here. He thought they were al too scared to come out on their own. And then the man took his eyes off the television to examine the newcomers.

There were tattoos al the way up his neck: flames and skulls; his right eye cloudy-white and slack.

Logan felt a tug at his sleeve and WPC Watson hissed in his ear, 'Isn't that--'

But the old man got there first, shouting, 'Mr McLeod! There's some fuckin' police bastards here tae see you!'

'Now, now Dougie, that's not nice,' said Logan, taking a step towards the old man. The Alsatian was on its feet in an instant, teeth bared, its low growl making the hair on Logan's neck stand on end. A string of saliva spiral ed down between the animal's broken teeth. It was an old dog, but it was vicious enough to frighten the crap out of him.

Nobody moved. The dog kept on snarling, the old man kept on glowering, and Logan kept on hoping he wasn't going to have to run for his life. Eventual y a round face stuck itself out of the back room.

'Dougie, what have I told you about that fuckin' dog?'

The old man cracked a smile, exposing green-and-brown dentures. 'You said if the pigs come in, let 'im tear their fuckin' throats out.'

The newcomer frowned, then a smile broke his face in two. 'Aye, you're right. So I did.'

He was a good thirty years younger than Dougie, but the old man stil cal ed him 'Mr' McLeod.

Simon McLeod had inherited his father's coarse features. His left ear was missing a chunk, courtesy of a Rottweiler cal ed Kil er whose head now adorned the back office.

'What do you bastards want then?' he asked, settling his massive arms on the counter.

Logan pulled out a colour picture of Geordie and held it out in front of him. 'You recognize this man?'

'Fuck you.' He hadn't even looked at the picture.

'Nice offer, but I'l pass this time.' Logan slapped the photo down on the grimy counter.

'Now: do you recognize him?'

'Never seen him before.'

'He was a loudmouthed git from Edinburgh. Came up here to do a job for Malk the Knife. Made some big bets and didn't settle them.'

Simon McLeod's face closed up. 'We don't have a lot of people who don't settle. It's against management policy.'

'Take another look, Mr McLeod. Sure you don't recognize him? Ended up floating face down in the harbour with his kneecaps missing.'

Simon's eyes opened wide and he slapped a hand over his mouth. 'Oh, him! God, now you mention it, I do remember something about hacking his kneecaps off and throwing him in the harbour! Christ, why'd you no say so sooner? Aye: I kilt him and I'm no fuckin' bright enough to lie about it if the police come in here askin' stupid fuckin' questions.'

Logan bit his tongue and counted to five. 'Do you recognize him?'

'Get to fuck and take your bitch with you. The smel 's upsettin' Winchester.' He pointed at the snarling Alsatian. 'And even if I did recognize him, I'd sooner eat shite out a whore's arse than tel you.'

'Where's your brother Colin?'

'None of your fuckin' business: that's where he is. Now you goin' to fuck off, or what?'

Logan had to admit that there wasn't a lot more they could do here. He was al the way to the door before a thought struck him and he turned. 'Hacked off,' he said, frowning. 'How did you know the man's kneecaps had been hacked off? I never said anything about that. I just said they were missing!'

McLeod just laughed. 'Aye, wel done, Miss Marple. When someone ends up in the harbour with no knees like that it's a message. It's no a very good message if everyone doesnae get it. Every fucker in the city knows you don't do what he did. Now fuck off.'

They stood outside on the top step of the Turf 'n Track, watching clouds scud across the sky. There was just enough fading sunshine to cut through the seasonal chil and Logan watched a pair of plastic bags playing chase around the concrete in front of the boarded-up shops.

WPC Watson leaned on the steel rail that ran along the front of the fortified buildings.

'What now?'

Logan shrugged. 'We were never going to get anything out of the McLeods. We might have pul ed in a couple of their punters, but can you see Dougie breaking down and spil ing his guts?'

'Not his own guts, no.'

'So now we stick the photo under the noses of the other shopkeepers here. You never know. If we don't mention the McLeods they might actual y tel us something.'

The Liverpudlian owner of the Chinese takeaway didn't recognize Geordie's face and neither did either of his Aberdonian staff. The video store had shut down years ago though the windows were stil ful of posters for forgotten blockbusters and 'straight to video' releases just visible through the aerosol scrawl. Last on the row was a combined newsagents, greengrocer and off-licence. The owner took one look at WPC Watson's uniform and got a sudden attack of laryngitis. But he did sel Logan a packet of extra strong mints.

Back outside again, the clouds had darkened the sky, the dying daylight giving up as the first fat drops of rain began to fal . They struck the concrete with a lifeless thud, one at a time, making large dark-grey circles that spread out, joining up as the heavens decided to real y let rip.

Dragging his suit jacket up over his head Logan ran for their rusty Vauxhal . Watson got there first and cranked on the blowers. They sat and steamed gently as the blowers did their best to clear the windows, sharing a packet of mints, watching hazy figures running for the shop doors to get in out of the rain for a mid-afternoon chicken chowmein, or the latest issue of Leather and Chains Monthly.

Simon McLeod was up to something. But then the McLeods were always up to something. The trouble was proving it. They were from the old school: the kind in which lessons were taught with a claw hammer. No one ever saw anything. No one ever squealed.

'So where now?'

Logan shrugged. 'Next bookies on the list I suppose.'

WPC Watson stuck the car into reverse and backed out of the parking space. The headlights clicked on, turning the stair-rod rain into silver daggers. They'd almost reached the main road when a rust-and-green estate car appeared out of nowhere. Watson slammed on the brakes, shouted 'Fuck!' and stal ed the engine.

As the estate parked roughly in front of the Turf 'n Track, she wound down the window and hurled a mouthful of abuse out into the rain. Most of which involved the driver of the offending car's rectum and WPC Watson's boot. She stopped in mid-sentence. 'Oh, God. Sorry, sir!'

Logan raised an eyebrow.

She blushed. 'I kinda forgot you were there. I mean he didn't indicate or anything.

Sorry.'

Logan took a deep breath and thought about what DI Insch had told him about the privileges of rank. He couldn't just sit there and say nothing. She was in uniform for God's sake!

What if it got back to the papers? 'Do you think a policewoman, in ful uniform, leaning out of a car window, swearing her head off, does a lot for the Force?'

'I didn't think, sir.'

'Jackie, when you do something like that you make us al look like a bunch of arseholes.

You piss off everyone who sees it, or hears about it second-hand. And you put your job on the line.'

Her blush went from strawberry to beetroot. 'I...sorry.'

He let her stew in silence for a slow count of ten, silently cursing inside. He'd hoped for a chance to impress her with his witty repartee, or his deductive acumen. Make her see what a great guy he was. The sort of guy you slept with twice. Giving her a dressing down hadn't been part of the plan. An 'undressing' down maybe...

Eight. Nine. Ten.

'Come on,' he said, trying out a friendly smile on her. 'I won't say anything about it if you don't.'

Not looking him in the eye, she said, 'Thank you, sir,' and started the car.

18

The atmosphere in the car never got much beyond polite as they made their way through the remaining bookies on Logan's list. WPC Watson cal ed him 'sir' and answered his questions, but she never volunteered anything unless it was directly pertinent to the case.

It was a crappy afternoon.

They slogged their way from the car to one betting shop after another.

'Have you seen this man?'

'No.'

Sometimes the 'no' came with a free 'fuck off and other times the 'fuck off was silent.

But it was always there. Except for the owner and staff at J Stewart and Son: Bookmakers est.

1974 in Mastrick. Who were surprisingly nice to them. Disturbingly, suspiciously nice.

'Jesus, that was freaky,' said Logan as they clambered back into the car. 'Look, they're stil smiling at us.' He pointed through the windscreen at a large woman with ratty grey hair tied into a bun on the top of her head. She waved back.

'Seemed nice enough to me,' said Watson, negotiating the car out of the car park. It was the most she'd said for about an hour.

'You never met Ma Stewart before?' asked Logan as they headed back towards the station. When WPC Watson didn't reply he took that as a no. 'I arrested her once,' he said as they drifted onto the Lang Stracht, the wide road carved up into bus lanes and weird pseudo-box-junctions liberal y sprinkled with bol ards and pedestrian crossings. 'Pornography. She was peddling it to school kids out the back of an old Ford Anglia. Nothing too heavy - no animals or anything like that. Just good old-fashioned German hard-core. Videos and magazines.' He snorted. 'Half the bloody children in Mastrick knew more about sex than their biology teacher.

We got cal ed in when this eight-year-old asked if you could get pregnant from fisting.'

A smal smile flickered round the corners of WPC Watson's mouth.

The offices of the Press and Journal went by on the left and Logan winced. With al the excitement and panic of being put in charge of the bin-bag case he'd forgotten al about Colin Mil er's visit this morning. He stil hadn't talked to DI Insch about the reporter's request for an exclusive. And Mil er said he had more information on 'Geordie' too. Logan pulled his phone out to call DI Insch, but didn't get any further than punching in the first two numbers.

A crackly voice boomed out of the radio. Someone had beaten up Roadkil .

They hadn't meant it to go this far. That was what the ringleaders said when questioned by the Police and the Press. They just wanted to make sure their children were safe. It wasn't right, was it? A grown man like that hanging around the school gates. And it wasn't the first time he'd done it either. Most afternoons he was there, just when the kids were getting let out. And he wasn't right in the head. Everyone knew he wasn't right in the head. He smel ed funny. It wasn't right.

So what if he got roughed up a little bit? It wasn't as if they'd meant it to go that far. But kids were missing! You know: kids. Kids like the ones that went to Garthdee Primary School. Kids like theirs. If the police had come sooner it wouldn't have got out of hand. If they'd come when they were cal ed, none of this would have happened.

So when you real y thought about it, it was al the police's fault.

The man sitting on the other side of the interview table had seen better days. Yesterday for example. That was the last time Logan had set eyes on Bernard Duncan Philips, AKA Roadkil .

He'd been pretty tatty-looking then, but at least his nose hadn't looked as if someone had taken a sledgehammer to it. Bruises were already running rampant across his face and one eye was swol en shut, the skin an angry purple. His beard was clean and spiky on one side where the hospital had washed away the dried blood. His lip was swol en up like a sausage and he winced every time he smiled. Which wasn't often.

The accusations level ed against him by the 'concerned parents' who'd beaten him up were too serious to ignore. So as soon as he was released from Accident and Emergency, he had found himself in police custody. And he fitted the Lothian and Borders profile: white male, mid-

twenties, mental health problems, menial job, no girlfriend, lives alone. The only error was the claim that he wouldn't do wel academical y. Roadkil had a degree in medieval history. But, as Insch said, see how much bloody good that had done him.

It had been a long, difficult and convoluted interview. Every time it looked as if they were about to get some sort of consistent statement out of Roadkil off he'd go on another rambling tangent. Al the time gently rocking back and forward in his seat. As Roadkil was mental y il they'd had to drag in an 'appropriate adult' to make sure everything was above board, so a social worker from Craiginches Prison had to sit next to Roadkil as he rocked and rambled and smel ed.

The interview room stank to high heaven. Eau de Rotting Animal and BO Pour Homme.

Roadkil real y, real y needed a bath. DI Insch had grabbed the first opportunity to get the hel out of there, leaving Logan and the social worker to suffer while he went off to check on Roadkil 's incoherent statement.